Mental Health Helplines Evaluation
This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of mental health helpline services. The evaluation will also look at the future of mental health helplines, as new media services such as texting, webchat and email are introduced.
Over the next few months, the research team will consult with fourteen member helplines. We hope to investigate:
- the views of helpline staff about the role of helplines
- the views of callers about the usefulness and utility of helplines and the outcomes they enable people to achieve
- the awareness of helplines amongst GPs and Community Mental Health Teams (CMHTs) across England
- the ways in which helplines address the issues of equality and diversity across their services
On completion of the project, we hope to make recommendations to member helplines highlighting areas that are performing well and those that could be improved upon.
We will report our findings in Spring 2012.
Have you ever used a mental health helpline?
If so, we’d love to hear about your experience. Take part in our research by completing our online survey (deadline: 26 February)
Lauren has extensive experience conducting research projects and evaluations across the fields of mental health and learning disabilities in both the UK and in Canada. She holds a MSc in Mental Health Studies and a BSc in Psychology.
Kirsten is currently studying for a BSc in International Studies and works on the Learn 2B project for the Foundation. She specialises in children and young people's mental health, the development of age appropriate services and non-medical interventions.