The Humber and North Yorkshire Green Social Prescribing (HNY GSP) programme, led by HEY Smile Foundation, were commissioned as one of seven sites across England to develop a ‘test and learn’ site for GSP. A central objective of the HNY GSP programme was to ‘test the ways in which connecting people with nature could improve mental wellbeing’. To this end, a cohort evaluation was conducted (overseen by NIHR ARC Y&H’s Mental Health theme at the University of York) to collect before and after outcome data to demonstrate the mental health benefits of engaging in nature-based interventions linked to the GSP initiative across the six places of the Humber and North Yorkshire Health and Care Partnership: East Yorkshire, Hull, North Yorkshire, Vale of York, North Lincolnshire and North East Lincolnshire.
Summary findings from the cohort evaluation are presented in the infographic on the left (click to download here). The findings show that by taking part in outdoor and in-nature activities, 70% of participants saw improvements in their anxiety score. Download the full HNY GSP programme cohort evaluation report here: https://www.york.ac.uk/media/healthsciences/documents/research/mentalhealthresearch/HNY_GSP_Final%20Report_%20v1_150523.pdf
See the full HNY GSP Cohort Evaluation here: https://www.york.ac.uk/healthsciences/research/mental-health/projects/humber-north-yorkshire-green-social-prescribing/