UCL Discovery
UCL home » Library Services » Electronic resources » UCL Discovery

Influences on participation in a programme addressing loneliness among people with depression and anxiety: findings from the Community Navigator Study

Frerichs, J; Billings, J; Barber, N; Chhapia, A; Chipp, B; Shah, P; Shorten, A; ... Pinfold, V; + view all (2020) Influences on participation in a programme addressing loneliness among people with depression and anxiety: findings from the Community Navigator Study. BMC Psychiatry , 20 , Article 565. 10.1186/s12888-020-02961-x. Green open access

[thumbnail of s12888-020-02961-x.pdf]
Preview
Text
s12888-020-02961-x.pdf - Published Version

Download (933kB) | Preview

Abstract

Background: Loneliness is associated with negative outcomes, including increased mortality and is common among people with mental health problems. This qualitative study, which was carried out as part of a feasibility trial, aimed to understand what enables and hinders people with severe depression and/or anxiety under the care of secondary mental health services in the United Kingdom to participate in the Community Navigator programme, and make progress with feelings of depression, anxiety and loneliness. The programme consisted of up to ten meetings with a Community Navigator and three optional group sessions. / Methods: Semi-structured interviews were carried out with participants (n = 19) shortly after programme completion. A co-produced two-stage qualitative approach, involving narrative and reflexive thematic analysis, was undertaken by members of the study’s working group, which included experts by experience, clinicians and researchers. / Results: The narrative analysis showed that individuals have varied goals, hold mixed feelings about meeting other people and define progress differently. From the thematic analysis, six themes were identified that explained facilitators and challenges to participating in the programme: desire to connect with others; individual social confidence; finding something meaningful to do; the accessibility of resources locally; the timing of the programme; and the participant’s relationship with the Community Navigator. / Conclusions: We found that people with severe depression and/or anxiety supported by secondary mental health services may want to address feelings of loneliness but find it emotionally effortful to do so and a major personal challenge. This emotional effort, which manifests in individuals differently, can make it hard for participants to engage with a loneliness programme, though it was through facing personal challenges that a significant sense of achievement was felt. Factors at the individual, interpersonal and structural level, that enable or hinder an individual’s participation should be identified early, so that people are able to make the best use out of the Community Navigator or other similar programmes.

Type: Article
Title: Influences on participation in a programme addressing loneliness among people with depression and anxiety: findings from the Community Navigator Study
Location: England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1186/s12888-020-02961-x
Publisher version: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12888-020-02961-x
Language: English
Additional information: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
Keywords: Loneliness, Co-production, Qualitative research, Anxiety, Depression, Social inclusion
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Brain Sciences > Division of Psychiatry
URI: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10116321
Downloads since deposit
49Downloads
Download activity - last month
Download activity - last 12 months
Downloads by country - last 12 months

Archive Staff Only

View Item View Item