Situational First Aid is the keystone of the Social Prescription.

SFA is the provision of assistance to people who are distressed by life circumstances, or at risk of becoming distressed. This includes:

• Looking for explanations instead of labels (e.g. focusing on what might be going on in someone’s life rather than identifying their response as the problem)
• Identifying and addressing social needs, eg, financial stress, housing, safety
• Facilitating social connection instead of medicalisation (e.g. walking clubs that address physical and mental rehabilitation at the same time as improving connectedness).
• Addressing shortcomings in the workplace, not the worker (e.g. short-term contracts, unsustainable workload, unhealthy culture, lack of support)
• Using ordinary language instead of medical jargon (e.g. ‘distress’ or ‘grief’ rather than ‘depression’)

We hope to encourage our trainees to make meaning of people’s difficult experiences and avoid just diagnosing them with a mental illness, which often invalidates suffering.