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Headroom: Promoting mental wellbeing

Headroom is a campaign by the BBC to encourage people to look after their mental wellbeing. It aims to help people cope with the stresses and strains of life, and perhaps find answers to more complex problems.

Headroom is supported by a web site - Headroom| - which contains a wealth of resources: wellbeing guides, videos featuring Ruby Wax discussing a wide range of conditions such as Anorexia, Bipolar disorder etc, a Newsletter and a Recommended Reading list. Books from the list form our first Headroom Collection. These are books that have helped others, suggested by Headroom's charity partners, and libraries. The books have been reviewed by a Bibliotherapist.

Topics covered by the collection include - anger, depression, anxiety, stress, obsessive compulsive disorder, addictions, suicide, bereavement, self harm, eating disorder, bipolar disorders, sleep problems and more. Fiction and poetry are included.

We will be placing Headroom Collections in several libraries this year. We see them as complementing our successful "Self Help" collections. These are part of the national Book Prescription scheme.

In Calderdale the scheme is run by Libraries in partnership with the Primary Care Trust. Patients with mild to moderate mental health problems may be prescribed books by their GP instead of medication. The Self Help collections consist of titles carefully chosen by medical practitioners. We have collections at Central Library, Halifax, and our Libraries at Todmorden, Brighouse, Hebden Bridge and Shelf.

These collections have been very successful, and will be placed in more libraries. Anyone can borrow these books.

In addition, the Central Library, Halifax, now has a music therapy collection.

Our Headroom, Self Help and Music Therapy collections form part of our ongoing efforts to promote healthy living.

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