Characteristics, motivations and experiences of volunteer befrienders for people with mental illness: a systematic review and narrative synthesis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The literature suggests that many people in the general population tend to distance themselves from those with mental illness. However, there are volunteers that behave differently, spending their free time with people with mental illness and providing direct input in the form of befriending. Whilst there are a range of befriending programmes, little is known about who these volunteer befrienders are, and a previous review of different forms of volunteering in mental health care found data on only 63 befrienders.

Methods

We conducted a systematic electronic search of databases (BNI, CNIL, EMBASE, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Cochrane Registers, Web of Science) to detect all papers reporting characteristics of befriending volunteers in mental health care published between 20

SUBMITTER: Toner S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6278150 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature