Efficacy of ‘Five Ways to Well-being Program’ in Promotion of Mental Wellbeing for Persons Admitted to Acute Psychiatric Service

Promotion of wellbeing programs seldom described in psychiatric service locally. Through the Five Ways to Wellbeing program (NEF, 2008 ), including the actions to Connect, Be Active, Take Notice, Keep Learning and Give, clients were encouraged to make choices according to their wants and better their health. To document the applicability of the Five Ways to Wellbeing program in acute psychiatric settings. Prospective cohort analysis of patients admitted to In-patient Psychiatric wards within 12 months period. Clients are free to choose the seven sessions of intervention from topics of ‘Five ways to wellbeing program’ or ‘Illness Management Recovery program’. Measurements include Pre- and post-intervention assessment of subjective well-being (C-SWEMWBS) and hope perception (Hope Scale), number of clinics visits and readmission rate 6 months post discharge. 623 admitted patients were recruited with 333 elected for Wellbeing Program. 79 within the group completed the five Ways of Wellbeing while the rest attended a mix of Wellbeing & Recovery program. The change of SWEMWBS score and Hope score is found correlated significantly with number of sessions of the Wellbeing Program attended, age, diagnostic group, onset years and employment status upon admission. The change of SWEMWBS score and the Hope score is significant across all participants of various diagnosis ( p < 0.05). Stepwise regression confirmed five sessions of Five Ways to Wellbeing Program was strong predictor for change in SWEMWBS score (R = 0.169; Sig. = 0.001; F = 10.338) and Hope score (R = 0.115; Sig. = 0.031, F = 4.702). Multivariate Test of between subject effect ( n = 357) also showed significant mixed effect of Wellbeing and Hope scores on Clinic visits ( R 2 = 0.933; p = 0.000; F = 7.42; power = 1, alpha = 0.025), and Readmission rate to psychiatric wards ( R 2 = 0.908; p = 0.000; F = 5.285; power = 1; alpha = 0.025) within 6 month after discharge. The five ways of wellbeing program so developed has shown statistically effective in promotion of Mental Wellbeing state and personal Hope among the clients with severe mental illness during their acute admission phase. More extensive research on their protective effects on clinic visits and readmission in severe mental illness population is warranted.