Eco-Therapy is a two-year project that aims to develop and enhance the skills of professionals to better support people with addiction problems by introducing an innovative ecotherapy approach in vocational training institutions and treatment centres.
Substance abuse is one of the biggest challenges EU societies are facing. According to WHO, per capita alcohol consumption in the European Union is the highest in the world. Ecotherapy is a formal type of therapeutic treatment, which involves doing outdoor activities in nature (e.g. gardening, physical activity in nature, cycling, etc.). Its benefits can have a tremendous impact in the rehabilitation process of people suffering from substance abuse disorders. Despite the research done in the field of ecotherapy and its positive impact on health disorders, this method is still not utilized in the field of substance abuse disorders in Europe.
Key Results
The project has developed a set of educational material and interactive training resources for training and therapy centres, trainers and counsellors in the field of ecotherapy. More concretely, the project has developed:
- A guide for vocational training institutions and therapy centres describing the benefits and best practices for the use of ecotherapy and providing practical guidelines for the delivery of vocational training courses on ecotherapy
- An ecotherapy curriculum and Open Educational Resources introducing the topic to drug and alcohol abuse counsellors to enable them to implement ecotherapy sessions in their everyday work
- An ecotherapy digital toolkit for VET trainers with exercises, methodology and training material, to implement such courses.
- A MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) to make available the training to a large number of interested professional
The Partners
