Black Country Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust has teamed up with local football clubs to help boost the mental health of young people.
The Reflexions team at BCHFT are working with the foundations at West Bromwich Albion, Wolves and Walsall FC to give young people the chance to learn more about their mental health, while having fun and getting exercise through having a kick about.
Reflexions provides mental health support in schools and currently works with 216 schools across Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton.
The team work with young people, parents and educational settings to offer one to one support, group interventions and whole school assemblies and workshops.
They mainly take referrals from schools during term time, and during school holidays offer partnership sessions with a variety of organisations such as the local football clubs.
Reflexions and the clubs teamed up to offer ‘Kick and Chat’ sessions over half term this Spring which saw young people take part in a mixture of anxiety workshops and football sessions with coaches at the Hawthorns, Molineux and Bescot Stadium, alongside workshops for parents and carers.
The young people taking part were also given resource packs from Reflexions to provide strategies to help them to manage their emotions.
85% of the young people who attended said the workshop improved their mood, while 100% of the parents and carers who attended said they found the workshop helpful.
Zoe Gilbert, service manager for Reflexions, said: “The feedback was really positive from the young people and parents and carers who took part. By teaming up with the football clubs we can reach young people who we may not have been able to easily engage or who haven’t used our services before.
“Combining physical activity with emotional wellbeing has a very positive impact on the health and wellbeing of children and young people so we are so excited to be working with our local football clubs on a number of different projects, which will all help to get young people talking about their mental health.
“The future is bright for ‘Kick and Chat’ initiatives so look out for events coming soon.”
It is just one of the ways the team is working with football clubs on important mental health initiatives. The foundations at both Walsall and Wolves are set to receive mental health first aid training from the Trust while the team has also supported West Bromwich Albion to develop their own mental health training.
Erin Hicken, from the Albion Foundation, said: “We are really excited to partner with Reflexions. The Kick ‘n’ Chat sessions in May and the youth voice session in June are great examples of how the Foundation and the NHS can come together to better support young people and parents in Sandwell and Dudley. We are looking forward to developing and growing this partnership further.”