A CHARITY-run group that supports people who hear voices in their heads has been saved from closure thanks to NHS funding.

The Hearing Voices Group, run by mental health charity Mind Taunton and West Somerset since October, was threatened with closure until Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust stepped in with a year's funding.

Group facilitator and founder Marc Lewis said: “I’m absolutely thrilled that Somerset Partnership NHS Trust has been able to come through for us and provide us with this funding.

"Having had a family history of people who experience voices and visions, I know how isolating those experiences can be due to how stigmatised mental health issues are in society.

"This funding means we can continue to provide social support and a listening ear to the people that need us.”

Neil Jackson, head of mental health inpatient crisis and specialist care division at Somerset Partnership, said: "Hearing Voices Groups can be very positive and effective ways of overcoming frightening experiences such as voices and visions.

"For many people the sharing of these experiences in a supportive group, and being able to learn coping strategies from each other are an important part of recovery.

“We have agreed to fund Taunton Hearing Voices Group for the next 12 months to give Mind in Taunton and West Somerset time to fundraise to support the group and this service in the long-term.”

The Taunton Hearing Voices Group takes place every Thursday from 2pm till 4pm at Chamberlains Café, at North Street Church, offering a safe and encouraging space for people who see visions and hear voices.

 

FACTFILE.

*Between 70 and 90 per cent of people who hear voices do so following traumatic events.

*Voices can be male, female, without gender, child, adult, human or non-human.

*People may hear one voice or many. Some people report hearing hundreds, although in almost all reported cases, one dominates above the others.

*Voices can be experienced in the head, in the ears, outside the head, in some other part of the body, or in the environment.

*Voices often reflect important aspects of the hearer’s emotional state – emotions that are often unexpressed by the hearer.

*Click here for more information about hearing voices.