Nature-based delivery of behavioral activation and mindfulness to promote well-being, reduce mental health and substance use

Our team is launching a new initiative to gather patient and provider perspectives on how to incorporate nature-based delivery of behavioral activation and mindfulness-based approaches to reduce mental health, substance use.

We seek to understand how to safely and effectively promote exposure to the natural world in marginalized communities globally. This work is being conducted throughout active trials throughout Maryland (Baltimore, Eastern Shore) with peer recovery specialists working in opioid use disorder treatment; in DC focused on individuals at risk or living with HIV; as well as in the context of peer- and community health worker models in South Africa.

Our goal is to capture patient and provider perspectives to (1) adapt existing behavioral activation and mindfulness interventions to promote nature exposure; (2) evaluate nature-based delivery as an implementation strategy for task shared mental health and substance use care globally; while also (3) promoting provider well-being and reduced burnout in task sharing models.