The Recovery Star is a tried and tested care planning tool which allows mental health services to work in a visual way with service users and their families, carers and supporters to support and measure change, to identify the support and treatment needed and to help prioritise treatment goals.
The Recovery Star is designed to support individuals in understanding where they are in terms of recovery and the progress they are making, providing both the service user and staff member with a shared language for discussion of mental health and wellbeing.
In supporting and measuring change, the Recovery Star helps in a practical way to develop a recovery focused care plan that clearly sets out what the service will provide and how the service user and others will contribute.
Recovery in mental health, has been defined in a number of ways including:
- Finding and believing in oneself
- Restabilising a positive identity
- Building a meaningful life
- Taking responsibility and control
The Recovery Star was developed by the mental health providers forum and is used successfully in many mental health services
With the support of our commissioners we began in 2011 to pilot the Recovery Star in some of our community teams on the basis that if it went well, we would use it in all our teams.
The pilot was successful and attracted positive feedback from service users and staff including:
"I found it really helpful, we were able to resolve several issues"
"We discussed my latest problems. We were able to look at strategies to reduce my worries"
"I moved one step closer to being discharged"
The Trust is now looking to use the Recovery Star with service users and their families in all our community teams and to test its effectiveness in one of our specialist inpatient wards.