UPSIDES: a global peer support project

In peer support people with lived experience of mental health conditions and recovery offer support hope and encouragement to others, currently in crisis. This intervention has shown promising results in the recovery and empowerment of persons with mental health problems in various contexts and is recommended in various guidelines such as the S3 guideline in Germany.
The UPSIDES project (www.upsides.org) is a cooperation of eight international study partners in Africa, Asia, and Europe. Based on a shared understanding of mental health conditions and recovery the UPSIDES intervention was developed and is currently implemented to scale up peer support in different contexts. The UPSIDES intervention will be evaluated in a multi-center randomized controlled trial at six study sites in Uganda, Tanzania, India, Israel and Germany
Different speaker of the international UPSIDES consortium will target peer support with a focus on global innovation in mental health systems. The UPSIDES project and intervention will be presented. Throughout the last year, UPSIDES peer support workers were trained in a 12 module core training to deliver peer support in order to enhance the social inclusion of people with mental health conditions. In this pilot phase, 45 peer support workers were trained at the six implementations sites by trainer tandems with professional and lived experience. The symposium will offer first experiences from the implementation sites, with a deeper inside in the mental health systems of 3 low- or middle-income countries.