Using the urban environment to help people recover from psychosis

Psychosis is mental health condition that affects around 0.7 per cent of adults in England.

Symptoms of psychosis disconnect people from reality as experienced by others around them. Many people with psychosis experience problems functioning that can persist for years. They may struggle to go outside, work, or develop relationships.

Treatment for psychosis is more likely to be successful if it is started early. Most people with psychosis are now treated in the community and most live in urban areas.

Research suggests that living in an urban area contributes to the development of a psychosis and may also impact recovery. For example, busy and noisy environments are often anxiety-provoking for people recovering from psychosis and can increase feelings of paranoia.

Government policy encourages local communities to support mental health recovery. However, the impact of the local environment is not usually included in psychosis treatment plans. Also, there are very few evidence-based treatment programmes that focus on the role of place.

Project aims

In this project, we will investigate how people recently diagnosed with psychosis can be supported to use urban neighbourhoods to strengthen their recovery. We will use this to design a place-based recovery programme for people who have experienced a first episode of psychosis.

We will:

• Look at theories and evidence on how local places can improve mental health
• Use this to come up with an outline of how a place-based recovery programme for people with psychosis could work
• Ask people who have had a first episode of psychosis about their local areas, to identify aspects of urban living that support or challenge recovery
• Interview staff who work with people recently diagnosed with psychosis to find out how able and willing they are to deliver place-based recovery programmes
• Develop a place-based recovery programme to help people who have had a first episode of psychosis and live in an urban neighbourhood improve their ability to function and their quality of life

What we hope to achieve

By the end of the project, we hope to have created an outline place-based recovery programme to help people who have had a first episode of psychosis and live in an urban neighbourhood to improve their ability to function and their quality of life. The next stage of the work will be to test how our programme could work in practice.