VISN 5 MIRECC - Living Well
What is Living Well?
People living with a serious mental illness die younger when compared to the general population due in part to high rates of chronic medical conditions and poor lifestyle behaviors including smoking, alcohol and drug use, physical inactivity and poor diet (1-6).
Interventions helping people better self-manage common medical and psychiatric challenges can be helpful. People living with medical and psychiatric conditions can serve as role models in helping others with similar challenges. The VISN 5 MIRECC Director, Dr. Goldberg, and his team developed and tested a 12-session group intervention called Living Well (7-8).
Living well was designed to be co- led by a person living with both a medical and psychiatric condition and a clinician. The goal of Living Well is to enhance self-efficacy and motivation through education and skills training in action planning and problem solving. Sessions focus on learning about a range of health-related topics. These include: mental health recovery, healthy eating, physical activity, symptom management, and other subjects. Participants also create weekly action plans and engage in group-based problem solving to reach their lifestyle goals.
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Citations
- Olfson M, Gerhard T, Huang C, et al: Premature mortality among adults with schizophrenia in the United States. JAMA Psychiatry, 2015; 72:1172–1181
- Walker ER, McGee RE, Druss BG: Mortality in mental disorders and global disease burden implications: a systematic review and meta-analysis. JAMA Psychiatry 2015; 72:334–341
- Parks J, Svendsen D, Singer P, et al (eds): Morbidity and Mortality in People with Serious Mental Illness. Alexandria, VA, National Association of State Mental Health Program Directors, 2006
- Prochaska J, Das S, Kelly, C, Young-Wolf: Smoking, mental illness and public health. Annual Review of Public Health, 2017, 38(1):165-185
- RachBeisel J, Scott J, Dixon, L. Co-occurring severe mental illness and substance use disorders: A recent review, Psychiatric Services, 1999, 50(11): 1427-1434
- Daumit G, Goldberg R, Christopher A, et al: Physical activity patterns in adults with severe mental illness, Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, 2005, 193(10); 641-646
- Goldberg R., Dickerson F., Lucksted, A, et al: Living Well: An intervention to improve self-management of medical illness for individuals with serious mental illness. Psychiatric Services, 2013 64(1): 51-57
- Muralidharan, A., Brown, C.H., Peer, J., Klingaman, E., Hack, S., Li, L., Walsh, M.B., and Goldberg, R. (2019). Living Well: An Intervention to Improve Medical Illness Self-Management for Individuals with Serious Mental Illness. Psychiatric Services, 2019 70:19-25.c.
Download the Living Well Manual & Facilitator Training Manual
Download the manuals today. We will collect some of your information here and then provide downloadable PDFs of the two manuals.
Questions? Contact Richard.Goldberg@va.gov
Living Well Study Highlighted in the VISN 5 MIRECC Link
Living Well: An intervention to help people better manage common medical and psychiatric challenges
The Link is a guiding link between VISN 5 MIRECC research outcomes and practice and treatment applications. It includes an overview of a research article and then links those findings to considerations for Veterans, Veteran Families and clinicians.
