How can social prescribing support wellbeing?

More than £3.6m of government funding has been awarded to the National Academy of Social Prescribing to support wellbeing, including the impact of loneliness

CREDIT: This is an edited version of an article that originally appeared on gov.uk

Social prescribing can help those experiencing grief, addiction, dementia and loneliness through a wide range of community-led social activities, services and opportunities that have proven benefits for people’s health and wellbeing.

It could include gardening clubs for people to socialise and learn new skills, new exercise classes to build confidence and become healthier, as well as financial advice for people with money worries, among many other initiatives.

The grant will support the National Academy of Social Prescribing (NASP) to build on its previous successes such as the Thriving Communities Fund, which has established 36 projects helping more than 10,000 people and championing local community and voluntary groups.

It has also introduced an academic collaboration to develop a robust evidence-base for social prescribing and the benefits it can bring to the nation’s health. It will continue to build innovative partnerships between the health system and the voluntary sector to ensure that social prescribing reaches those most in need.

How the grant will be implemented 

Examples of the opportunities that could be bolstered by the funding include:

• supporting the NASP to continue driving forward the recommendations from the Power of Music report, using musical activities to help people with dementia;
• the delivery of Social Prescribing Day 2024 internationally, bringing together people across local, national and global platforms to share learning and promote successes within social prescribing;
• the creation of products, such as podcasts, to showcase the benefits of a connected social prescribing system;
• launching new social prescribing evidence reviews which will be published in spring 2023.