Community-Based Companioning

Our version of sub-clinical social-emotional-existential support is being expanded in 2023, thanks to the Innovation Grant we’ve recently received from the Lord Mayor’s Charitable Foundation.

Social Health will be recruiting, training, vetting and supporting 40 companions to walk alongside people dealing with a wide variety of adverse circumstances. Community members are being referred to the program by healthcare agencies, aged care facilities, and the charitable funeral enterprise known as Bereavement Assistance.

To learn more about how to volunteer for the program or to refer someone who might benefit from companioning, feel free to drop us a line at getintouch@socialhealthaustralia.org.

Meaning, Purpose and Connection

Meaning, Purpose and Connection (MPC) supports older adults dealing with social isolation, loneliness, transition and loss.

To date the project has trained 25 volunteers, from a variety of fields and backgrounds, in the art of ‘walking alongside’ a person in crisis. Integrating principles of spiritual companioning and mindfulness, MPC pairs volunteer practitioners with people referred to us by local healthcare agencies.

In addition to completing a vetting process and a six-part training program, volunteer Social Health Practitioners also participate in regular online reflective practice sessions.

The well received project, which received seed funding from the City of Glen Eira, City of Bayside and Humanists Victoria, will be expanding with the involvement of more healthcare agencies and community organisations.

“I am reminded daily of the power of social connection and its impact on mental health and wellbeing.”

– Christeen Waring, Psychologist and Social Health Practitioner

Conversation in Isolation

Created by a group of Monash Uni medical students as a response to the COVID-19 health crisis, Conversation in Isolation brings forward volunteers capable of making regularly scheduled phone calls, emails, texts and letters to people impacted by isolation/loneliness.

Social Health became involved with this project last year by facilitating integrated reflective practice for volunteers in the program. This provided opportunities for participants to debrief difficult encounters, refine their deep listening skills and connecting with other volunteers.

This year, we will formally be auspicing Conservation in Isolation and working with its student leadership team to expand the initiative. A new project involving 18 to 25 years impacted by uncertainty and adversity is planned to launch later this year, involving headspace centres in Elsternwick, Bentleigh and Syndal and will be funded by the City of Monash.

“I found the whole experience quite therapeutic and loved the practical elements. It really gave valuable insight into companioning, which I believe will help me engage more deeply with people, including future patients as a doctor, as well as those close to me.”
– Nisangi, 5th Year, Monash Medicine, participant of the ‘Conversation in Isolation’ initiative

Differences Behind Us

To assist the Royal Australian Navy in hiring their first practitioners providing pastoral care outside a ministerial context, Social Health created a credentialing model for vetting the first full-time chaplains working outside a ministerial context. The model was co-designed with the assistance of a solutions architect and a national taskforce comprised of four ministers working alongside four people who don’t identify as religious.

This year, Social Health will be working to adapt this model to be able to assess the competencies of volunteer practitioners at the community level who are beginning to support people impacted by isolation/loneliness. The envisioned model should be especially useful for the growing number of medical professionals turning to community organisations via social prescribing to support patients with non-medical issues.

“Social Health Australia is proving that when we put humanity first, we put our difference behind us.”
– Nageen Hussain, Social Health Compliance Officer and Credentialing Task Force Member

Kindness Retreat

Social Health Australia held its first kindness retreat this past July at the Yarra Valley Living Centre.

An opportunity to come together and reflect on ways of bringing more kindness into our lives, the weekend gathering featured several presentations from members of our community including one from Social Health’s patron, Hugh Mackay. Hugh’s talk and follow-up conversation with retreatants can be viewed here.

Plans are now underway for a kindness festival on these same grounds next April.

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