11/09/2007 - Submitted by: Tilia Bousios

Publisher: Managing Editor, Richard Wynne, Work Research Centre.
Distribution Date: 01/06/2007

New Project on Mental Health Promotion Begins

ProMenPol is a new project aiming to support the policy maker and the practitioner in the area of mental health promotion and protection (MHPP). Funded under the EU’s ‘Support to Policy’ programme, the project will address MHPP for 3 target groups – school going children and adolescents, people in the workplace and people who are resident in older people’s homes.

The incidence of mental distress and disease is increasing rapidly throughout Europe - mental health problems impact on about a quarter of the population at some time in their lives and are being experienced by 10% of adults regardless of culture or country at any point in time.

Mental health conditions can be catastrophic for individuals and families in health and social terms – it increases risks of persistent poverty, social exclusion and vulnerability to stigma and discrimination. The burden on society is equally severe in terms of lost productivity and treatment costs.

PROMENPOL’s Objectives

PROMENPOL sets out to identify useful and practical approaches to MHPP. It will develop a multidimensional approach to identifying and classifying effective tools for promoting mental health across the lifespan in the settings of schools, workplaces and older peoples’ residential homes. PROMENPOL will:

• Identify and Re-Package tools for mental health promotion and protection within three contexts - schools, the workplace and residences for older people.
• Produce a systematic and easily navigated knowledge management system populated with useful information, key references and important web links.
• Construct a set of three mental health toolkits tailored to the life span stage of target users and predominant context within which they live their lives i.e. school, work and residences for older people.
• Organise a series of pilot implementation projects to evaluate and review the knowledge base and toolkits.
• Produce a set of multi-sectoral policy principles designed to promote and support more proactive and targeted mental health initiatives in each of the sectors.
• Create sustainable collaboration between the key actors in the project to carry forward the results into the later stages of the project and beyond.

The Target Audience

PROMENPOL targets a range of stakeholders in the mental health protection and promotion arena including:

• Policy Makers;
• Practitioners;
• Researchers;
• NGOs representing Mental Health, Public Health, Schools and Older Persons issues; and
• Social Partners.

The project has developed a multi-stranded strategy to support the widespread dissemination of information, packaging of the information and the provision of support to both policy making and practice.

About the Project

The project runs from January 2007 - December 2009 and is being led by the German Federal Institute for Occupational Safety and Health - BAUA.

A complete listing of Project Partners and contact points is presented here.

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