Journal of Community Medicine & Health Education
Open Access

Research Article

Rationale, Component Description and Pilot Evaluation of a Physical Health Promotion Measure for People with Mental Disorders across Europe

¹Ulm University, Department of Psychiatry II, BKH Günzburg, Germany

²PSSRU, London School of Economics and Political Science, United Kingdom

³Universitá degli Studi di Verona, Department of Public Health and Community Medicine, Italy

⁴Regionspsykiatrien Randers, Randers, Denmark

⁵Community Care Department, Wolski Hospital, Poland

⁶Dokuz Eylül Üniversitesi Tip Fakültesi Psykiyatri Anabilim Dali, Turkey

⁷Psychiatric Hospital, Slovenia

⁸Social Work Department Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Czech Republic

⁹Medical University of Vienna, Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Austria

¹⁰Fondatzia za Choveshki Otnoshenia, Bulgaria

¹¹Clinic of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Vilnius University, Lithuania

¹²Aarhus University Hospital, Department M, Denmark

¹³Department of Methodology and Behavioral Sciences, University of Barcelona, Spain

¹⁴Psychiatric Hospital Campulung Moldovenesc, Campulung Moldovenesc, Romania

¹⁵The London School of Medicine & Dentistry Queen, Mary University of London, United Kingdom

¹⁶Faculty of Applied Social Sciences, Maria Grzegorzewska Academy of Special Education, Poland

*Corresponding Author:

Professor Thomas Becker
Department of Psychiatry II
Ulm University BKH Günzburg
Ludwig-Heilmeyer-Strasse 2
D-89312 Günzburg, Germany
Tel: ++49 8221 96 2001
Fax: ++49 8221 96 28160
E-mail: t.becker@uni-ulm.de

Received date: May 16, 2014; Accepted date: July 11, 2014; Published date: July 15, 2014

Citation: Weiser P, Kilian R, McDaid D, Berti L, Burti L, et al. (2014) Rationale, Component Description and Pilot Evaluation of a Physical Health Promotion Measure for People with Mental Disorders across Europe. J Community Med Health Educ 4:298. doi: 10.4172/2161-0711.1000298

Copyright: © 2014 Weiser P, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Introduction: The HELPS project aimed at developing a toolkit for the promotion of physical health in people with mental disorders to reduce the substantial excess morbidity and mortality in the target group. Methods: The HELPS toolkit was developed by means of national and international literature reviews, Delphi rounds with mental health experts and focus groups with mental health experts and patients/ residents in 14 European countries. The toolkit was translated into the languages of all participating countries, and usability of toolkit modules was tested. Results: The toolkit consists of several modules addressing diverse somatic health problems, lifestyle, environment issues, patient goals and motivation for health-promotion measures. It aims at empowering people with mental illness and staff to identify physical health risks in their specific contexts and to select the most appropriate modules from a range of health promotion tools. Discussion: The HELPS project used an integrative approach to the development of simple tools for the target population and is available online in 14 European languages. Preliminary evidence suggests that the toolkit can be used in routine care settings and should be put to test in controlled trials to reveal its potential impact.

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