HELPS – Promoting Physical Health in Mental Health

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Department of Psychiatry II
Ulm University
Ludwig-Heilmeyer-Str. 2 89312 Günzburg
Germany

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The HELPS Project

The overarching aim of HELPS is to improve the physical health status of residents with mental disorders, mental disability or dependency living in social and health care institutions.

Residents in health and social care Institutions for people with mental health problems have a poor physical health status resulting in reduced life expectancy.
This is incompatible with the protection of human rights and dignity. There are no specific policies to improve the health status of residents in such care institutions.

General Objectives

to bring together a multi-disciplinary consortium to gather relevant knowledge in the field and identify best practice across Europe.
to collect currently fragmented knowledge on the prevalence of major diseases, risk factors of poor physical health, and effective and cost-effective intervention strategies to improve health status in the target population.
to identify best practice for health promotion in mental health and social care Institutions across Europe; criteria for best practice will include evidence of efficacy of physical health interventions and of effectiveness in routine care, cost issues and feasibility of interventions in different contexts across Europe.
to develop a health promoting tool that will empower residents and staff to identify the most relevant risk factors in their specific context and subsequently select the most appropriate action out of a range of defined health promoting interventions. The tool must be widely acceptable and feasible to impact on policy and practice.
to disseminate the information gathered in the project, the intervention tool, and the instruction kit to put it to use.

Monday 4 January 2010

We are profoundly moved by the death of John Henderson, and we are very sorry that he is no longer with us.

The European Network for Promoting the Health of Residents in Psychiatric and Social Care Facilities (HELPS) has lost one of its most important spiritual fathers. John was involved in HELPS from the very beginning, and without his wisdom, experience and commitment to mental health promotion the project would not have been successfully established. As a representative of Mental Health Europe and as a member of the HELPS project steering committee John Henderson had a central role in the supervision, management and promotion of the project. John took his responsibility for HELPS very conscientious as he did with all his commitments. Beyond inspiring all of us with his knowledge and his experience he always raised his critical voice in case of any danger of HELPS loosing its spirit and mission. We are profoundly indebted and thankful to John Henderson for his contribution, and we will do our best to achieve the aims of the HELPS project in a way which meets his expectations and standards.

Apart from this tremendous loss for our joint HELPS project we will miss John Henderson as a friend because of his warmth, his philanthropy and his sense of humour.

We deeply share the grief of John Henderson’s family and friends.

On behalf of the European Network for Promoting the Health of Residents in Psychiatric and Social Care Facilities (HELPS)

Finance:
HELPS has received funding from the European Union, in the framework of the Public Health Programme

Contract No.: 2006334

Duration: 2008 – 2010

Project Partners: 16 centres in 14 countries

Coordination: Prof. Dr. Thomas Becker, PD Dr. Reinhold Kilian - Ulm University
www.uni- ulm.de/psychiatrieII

Our project flyer is available for download here.
(PDF Document; Size approx. 600 KB)

The project flyer is available in different languages under Information in different languages. internal link

HELPS has received funding from the European Union,
in the framework of the Public Health Programme
Contract No.: 2006334