Surrey GSP

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What have we been up to so far, in 2022?

Hello, and Happy New Year to everyone! We've been really busy so far in 2022 so we wanted to take a moment to give you an update on what we've been doing!

Supporting green ideas

Throughout January we've been asking our community to have their say on what Green Social Prescribing should look like in Surrey, via our online surveys. We received approximately 200 responses to our surveys, so we'd like to say a big thank you to our community for sharing your opinions and ideas with us! Your feedback helps us create something bespoke, and meaningful to the communities we're serving.

We're now asking lots of community organisations to look at what you've told us you want, and then share with us their ideas for how they can use nature, green and blue spaces to support the mental health and wellbeing of our Surrey communities. These could be ideas like, guided nature walks through Surrey's Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty or creating community gardening opportunities for people living with dementia. Our programme can then support organisations to bring these ideas to life, so that, together, we can create more opportunities for people to access nature, get their boots muddy, plant some sunflowers, and so much more!

Upskilling professionals

We also want to make sure the health, social care and green sector professionals in Surrey know about the benefits of nature to people's wellbeing, and all the great opportunities there are for this in Surrey. Over here , we've started building a library of training and resources for professionals to access to learn more about nature and wellbeing. We're also looking at how we can provide additional training and networking events for these professionals so that we can encourage (where appropriate) referrals to Green Social Prescribing opportunities.

Thank you again for your support and feedback so far. There will be more opportunities later in the programme for you to get involved and have your say on our Green Social Prescribing programme, so please keep in touch and stay subscribed!

In the meantime, you might want to check out the video below. RSPB Scotland ran a Nature Prescriptions pilot , an initiative which provides an innovative way to support the health of people and nature.

Posted on 26th January 2022

by Jack Smith