St Helens Wellbeing Week to take place 14th to 20th May 2012

The Millennium Centre is working in partnership with over twenty local organisations to help deliver a brand new campaign to the local community. St Helens Wellbeing Week is aimed at improving people’s awareness, education and participation around health and wellbeing, and will take place this year between Monday 14th and Sunday 20th May.

All information and events in Wellbeing Week 2012 will centre around the concept of wellbeing. Wellbeing refers to ‘feeling good’ and ‘functioning well’, both mentally and physically, and research (NEF, 2008) suggests that people can significantly improve their wellbeing by following five simple steps:

• Connect with other people
• Be physically active
• Take notice of the world around you
• Keep learning new things
• Give back to other people

There will be a whole variety of exciting, fun and free events held across St Helens during the week for anyone to get involved with. From walks and guided tours to information sessions and exercise classes, there will be something to suit everyone of all tastes and all ages. The week will also aim to help raise awareness of local services that are available to people, which can help them improve their health and wellbeing.

The campaign will be launched with a marquee event on Monday 14th May (held in Church Square), where anyone can come down on the day to find out more about wellbeing, have a go at some fun activities and learn more about other events that are taking place during the rest of the week. There will also be a prize draw and there may be a special guest popping down too, so make sure you get yourself into St Helens town centre on that day!

Organisations involved in Wellbeing Week so far include The Millennium Centre, St Helens Gateway, The Wellbeing Project, Healthy in St Helens event, Age UK, St Helens Mind, Health Improvement Team, GoActive, Women Supporting Women, Platform 51, Healthy Heart Support Group, Helena Partnerships, Alzheimer’s Society, RASASC, Macmillan Cancer Information and Support, St Helens Star, the Hope Centre, PSS Young Carers and the Volunteer Centre.

Further information about Wellbeing Week and a full programme of events will be published shortly. In the meantime, you can keep up to date with the latest updates on the St Helens Gateway twitter page.

For further information or press enquiries about this story please contact Danny Woodworth (Marketing Coordinator) on 01744 675 132 or e-mail danny@tmcsh.org.uk

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Further information about wellbeing can be found via the Wellbeing Project. The Wellbeing Project have also recently produced a publication called St Helens’ Ways to Wellbeing that promotes wellbeing and local resources that can help people achieve wellbeing: http://www.wellbeingproject.co.uk/documents/StHelensWaystoWellbeing_highres020112.pdf

The full research conducted by the New Economics Foundation (2008) around the five ways to wellbeing can be found here: http://neweconomics.org/sites/neweconomics.org/files/Five_Ways_to_Wellbeing.pdf