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Laurier Talks

Social Prescribing for Older Adults

For Adults & Older Adults

In this talk, Dr. Barlow will discuss her work partnering with the Older Adult Centres’ Association of Ontario's (OACAO) Links2Wellbeing: Social Prescribing for Older Adults project. Social Prescribing is a holistic approach to healthcare that brings together the social and medical models of health and wellness. It provides a formal pathway for health providers to address the diverse determinants of health, using the familiar and trusted process of writing a prescription. While in it's early stages in collaboration with student researchers, the partnership aims to answer the following research questions:

• What are the benefits (if any) of social prescribing programs in the Ontario healthcare system? We will examine the benefits of social prescribing programs in Ontario for psychological well-being, physical health, and healthcare utilization.
• Who participates and benefits from social prescribing programs? We will explore the engagement with, and benefits of, social prescribing programs across social groups (e.g., groups based on ethnicity, gender, sexuality, social economic standing).
• What barriers are preventing people from engaging in social prescribing programs? Identify and describe the perceptions of the barriers to participating in social prescribing programming for both existing and potential patients across social groups, as well as healthcare practitioners and community centers.
• What are we going to do about it? We will mobilize the knowledge gained into practice and policy.

Presented in partnership with Wilfrid Laurier University.

About Dr. Meaghan Barlow:

Dr. Meaghan Barlow is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Wilfrid Laurier University. She received her B.Sc. in Psychology from Bishop’s University, and her M.A. and Ph.D. in Psychology at Concordia University, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research interests are broad, spanning lifespan, social, personality, and health psychology. More specifically, she researches: 1) self-regulatory factors that protect older adults’ well-being and health well into advanced old age, 2) the age-related structures, functions, and consequences of emotional experiences, and 3) the experiences, beliefs, and definitions of well-being across the adult lifespan. Visit www.meaghanbarlow.com for more details.

Programmer:  Charlie