Summary

This is the third year the depression programme has been included in the SPMHS outcomes report. Two well established outcome measures were used to investigate the programme’s effectiveness at reducing symptoms of depression. Both measures showed significant reductions in service users’ mean scores following completion of the programme , particularly pre and post Level A. It is understandable that there would be less change pre and post Level B, as this follows Level A, so most symptomatic change would have already occurred with the initial intervention.

These results provide evidence to suggest that, on average, people who complete the programme experience a significant reduction in symptoms associated with depression at each level of the programme. In future years the programme will consider including more demographic information on patients who complete the programme (e.g. age). Model-specific outcomes such as “compassion” or understanding and implementation of CBT skills may also be measured. This may help provide further evidence that the programme is effective and operating by its hypothesised mechanism.