Volunteering Good For Health?

Volunteering and gardening bring stability, improve self-esteem, reduce social isolation and help people learn new skills.

22:15 16 June 2016

A report released by Citizen’s Advice shows that 20per cent of GPs’ time was spent on patients with non-health conditions but are facing unemployment or personal problems that affect not just their mental but also physical health.

 

Some believe that the best solutions are social prescribing and gardening and referring patients with non-health conditions to a range of non-NHS services.

 

Aside from gardening and doing volunteer work, councils and voluntary sectors can work together to prescribe arts groups, walking schemes, dance classes and benefit advice, among others.

 

Alex-Marie Phillips was diagnosed with schizophrenia said that doing volunteer work at her local Mind charity shop gave her confidence.

"Volunteering had always been something I saw as selfless, something done purely for the benefit of others," she says.

"However, it has turned out to be so much more.

"My confidence came on in leaps and bounds.

"It has helped my social anxiety and has allowed me to get out more."

 

The Bromley-by-Bow Health Centre in east London is proving that volunteering and other simple everyday activities could, in some ways, play crucial roles as the new groundbreaking medicines.

 

It was set up in 1980s and works with about 2,000 people in a month. It helps cancer patients get back to work after treatment and refer patients to hospital for tests when a disease is suspected. It also encourages the elderly to take part in local arts group and those with mental health problems to do voluntary work.