Save the Date - Mindfulness - Health and Social Care Professionals Programme 2026

Funded by the HSE National HSCP Office as part of a joint CPD funding submission with Irish Association of Social Workers (IASW) and priority is for those employed in publicly funded health care settings. Before registering your interest in attending this course; please read the Terms and Conditions for attending publicly funded CPD events here

Rationale:

HSCP work-related stress can lead to several negative effects, including absenteeism, presenteeism, poor work performance, lack of staff engagement, compassion fatigue, staff burnout, mental health, and well-being issues (Bartlett et al., 2019). Post COVID, HSCPs highlight mental health and staff burnout as some of the most pressing issues, with health and social care organisations reporting high rates of HSCP turnover, which are negatively affecting the quality, consistency, and stability of services (Unison, 2022; IASW, 2023). Mindfulness based programmes (MBPs) have evidenced positive mental health and well-being outcomes for those working in health and social care (Vonderlin et al., 2020).

Overview:

The Mindfulness-based Health and Social Care (MBHSC) group programme is a unique mindfulness-based programme which focusses on improving the self-care and practice of health and social care professionals. MBHSC is a theory and evidence-informed programme which focusses on reducing stress, emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation of service users/patients, improving well-being and a range of practice skills and competencies. 

MBHSC will be delivered over a 6-week period from 27^th October. Single weekly sessions will be 1.5 hours in duration from 6-7.30pm each week. Weekly sessions will be facilitated online on MS Teams by Dr. Alan Maddock. Dr. Maddock is professionally qualified social worker who specialised in mental health social work, and is currently a Lecturer in Psychology. Dr. Maddock developed the MBHSC programme, is a trained mindfulness facilitator, and has over 10 years mindfulness meditation experience.

Programme Structure:

Each session will adhere to a standardised protocol and will cover health and social care practice exercises and topics which were examined within the context of mindfulness.

The course structure will consist of:

• Week 1: Introduction to mindfulness: theory and practice.
• Week 2: Mindfulness for health and social care practice: Stress, the thinking process, avoidant coping, and decentering.
• Week 3: Approach coping: Attachment, aversion, negative thinking, and approach coping.
• Week 4: Acceptance – the thinking process, approach coping, and staying present with service users/patients.
• Week 5: Self-Compassion – the thinking process, approach coping, and staying present with service users/patients.
• Week 6: Embedding mindfulness in our everyday lives and practice.

Each session will introduce different mindfulness-based practices (e.g. mindful body scanning, mindful yoga) and psychoeducation on the potential role that mindfulness could play in our self-care, and professional practice. Participants will be provided with psychoeducation on practical ways in which to apply the experiential learning attained from these practices when confronted with stressful personal and/or practice situations. The development of mindfulness is predicated upon regular and repeated practice, thus participants will be requested to engage in daily mindfulness-based homework exercises for 20 minutes per day, for 6 out of the 7 days, between sessions.  Each session will include practice role plays and discussion. This will allow participants to have an opportunity to apply their evolving experiential learning to a practice case context.

Course Dates and Times:

• Tuesday 27th October 6-7.30pm
• Tuesday  3rd November  6-7.30pm
• Tuesday  10th November 6-7.30pm
• Tuesday  17th November 6-7.30pm
• Tuesday  24th November 6-7.30pm
• Tuesday  1st December   6-7.30pm

*You must attend all 6 dates. 

• Develop an understanding of mindfulness, and gain an understanding of the theoretical underpinnings of how mindfulness can positively impact stress, burnout, anxiety, mood and psychological well-being.
• Increase self-awareness of, and gain insight into the interrelationships between thoughts, emotions, physical sensations and behaviours and explore each’s role in negative mental states using mindfulness practices.
• Gain a greater awareness of the importance of self-care for HSCP practice and to assess where mindfulness might support you in this.
• Understand the importance of developing a personal mindfulness practice.
• Develop our understanding of how engaging in mindfulness-based practices can improve our ability to develop decentering skills, which can allow us to
• disengage from the negative thinking patterns that can cause stress and distress – be seeing that ‘thoughts are not facts’.
• Begin applying our increasing mindful self-awareness of our thoughts, emotions, physical sensations and behaviours to HSCP practice situations.
• Learn about how both aversion/avoidance and attachment increase stress and negative thinking.
• Continue to apply experiential learning to HSCP practice situations – with a specific focus on the roles that aversion and attachment can play in HSCP practice.
• Learn about and apply adaptive mindfulness-based approach oriented coping skills that can be applied to improve our capacity to cope with stress, reduce feelings of burnout, anxiety and improve our mood.
• Learn about how both acceptance and self-compassion can reduce stress, feelings of burnout, anxiety and negative thinking.
• Discuss the ways in which we can keep our mindfulness practices going as the programme comes to an end.

Previous Evaluation:

The MBSWSC programme has been extensively evaluated. Two different randomised controlled trials with 121 social workers in Northern Ireland (Maddock et al., 2023; 20224) found that MBSWSC reduced stress, emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation of service users, symptoms of anxiety and depression, and improved well-being versus an active control group. A focus group study with 13 social workers who completed the MBSWSC programme found that MBSWSC participation social work assessments, service user engagement and team working, values oriented social work practice, and the development of key social work skills (including verbal communication, non-verbal communication, and reflection skills) (Maddock et al., 2024). 

Award:

This programme was awarded a Queen’s University Belfast Digital Teaching Award in June 2021.

References: (papers available via open access at the accompanying link)

Maddock, A., McGuigan, K., & McCusker, P. (2023). A randomised trial of Mindfulness-based Social Work and Self-Care with social workers. Current Psychology, 1-14. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12144-023-04410-w

Maddock, A., McGuigan, K., & McCusker, P. (2024). Mindfulness-based social work and self-care with social work professionals: Replication and expansion of a randomised controlled trial. The British Journal of Social Work, 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjsw/bcae011

Maddock, A., McGuigan, K., & McCusker, P. (2024). Exploring Social Work professionals’ Experiences of the Mindfulness-Based Social Work and Self-Care Programme: A Focus Group Study. Social Work in Public Health, 1-16. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/19371918.2024.2325564

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