MDF The Bipolar Organisation
has won £700,000 Lottery Fund Cash
to Help People with Bipolar Disorder
Funding for Farmer's Pioneering Project and Self-Management Courses
MDF the Bipolar Organisation Cymru has won more than £700,000 from the Big Lottery Fund to help potentially thousands of people affected by bipolar disorder in Wales.
Nearly £560,000 will fund the national charity for people with the condition to build on a ground-breaking project - set up by volunteer Gareth Richards, a farmer in Carmarthenshire, after being diagnosed with bipolar disorder - to support people being treated in hospital for the illness.
Gareth, aged 49, won Welsh Volunteer of the Year award 2006 in recognition for his work going into local psychiatric hospitals, supporting patients with bipolar disorder and introducing them to MDF's self-help group meetings when they left hospital. At the meetings people with bipolar (formerly known as manic depression) gain support from others with the condition and learn how to manage it.
The charity has now won funding from the Big Lottery Fund's Mental Health Matters programme to roll out the project, helped by Gareth, to 19 psychiatric hospitals along the M4 corridor over the next three years.
Gareth said: "After leaving hospital, I joined MDF Bipolar Cymru's self-help group in Carmarthen, where I learned really useful ways of coping with the illness".
"I was so impressed with the help, support and information I received there that I wanted to tell everyone who had bipolar about the organisation"
"I started going into local hospitals and meeting with people who had a diagnosis of bipolar, helping them understand what was happening, letting them know that they weren't alone and offering hope for the future."
MDF has also won, in a joint bid with the Mental Health Foundation charity, a further £155,000 to deliver 30 self-management training courses over the next three years in Wales.
The sessions, led by trainers who have made a successful recovery from the illness, are designed to help people diagnosed with bipolar disorder recognise their triggers that lead to extreme mood swings so that they can avoid them in the future.
Jane Wycherley, of MDF the Bipolar Organisation Cymru, said the courses would make a real difference to hundreds of people's lives.
She added: "Research has shown that learning how to 'self manage' is the key step towards recovery."
She said that the organisation wanted to build on the enormous success of Gareth's work in Carmarthenshire, so more people with bipolar disorder could access support from the self-help groups operating across Wales.
She added: "Since Gareth has been involved in meeting people in hospitals and introducing them to the self-help group there the number attending has rocketed. The Carmarthen group now has nearly 70 members, either with bipolar or their carers".
She went on: "The self-help groups are a meeting point for those with bipolar, but more than that people learn ways of coping with their illness, how to avoid the high manic and low depressed states that are common to the illness".
Gaynor Thomas, chair of MDF the Bipolar Organisation Cymru and who appeared with Stephen Fry in the BBC documentary 'The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive', said: "The important thing is that being part of a group like this reduces people's susceptibility to the extremes of the illness, to suicide and self-harm.
"This money will help us to reach out to many more of the thousands of people affected by the condition in Wales."
The MDF Cymru "+Plus Link Worker" project will start in autumn 2008, with £559,404 funding over three years.
Gaynor added: "The Big Lottery Fund award is going to pay for 40 volunteers with bipolar disorder to be able to go into the psychiatric units in the areas across the M4 corridor, ensuring that anyone suffering from bipolar disorder will be able to talk with someone who can empathise with what they are experiencing and give them hope for the future".
"Workers in the community will then help them and others with the illnesses, who've not been met in the units, to attend self-help groups".
Anyone with bipolar can still access the self-help groups operating throughout Wales now by contacting MDF the Bipolar Organisation Cymru on 08456340080 or by email at info@mdfwales.org.uk.
I was delighted to hear that MDF the Bipolar Organisation Cymru has been successful in its Big Lottery Fund bid. Empowerment is one of the four principles that underpin the mental health strategy in Wales. The self help schemes developed by MDF will play an important part in empowering people with bipolar disorder to manage their conditions. Self help cannot be underestimated in its importance in supporting recovery and restoring hope to people who have experienced a severe mental health problem. I wish MDF every success in taking the scheme forward and it is all the more pleasing that the project is a direct result of a service user innovation.
Congratulations MDF Cymru
Phill Chick Mental Health Director
Welsh Assembly Government
MDF the BiPolar Organisation Cymru
22-29 Mill Street
City of Newport
South Wales
NP20 5HA
Tel: 01633 244244
Help Line: 08456 340 080
Fax: 01633 244111
Email: info@mdfwales.org.uk
Website: www.mdfwales.org.uk
Find Us: Location Map
