Introduction

The Mood Management Group is an integral part of the programme at the Oliver Zangwill Centre for Neuropsychological Rehabilitation. Although clients attend the Psychological Support Group and individual mood sessions, it is clear that clients experience common emotional sequelae (Williams and Evans, 2003) that benefit from a group approach.

Whilst the Psychological Support Group (Chapter 9) provides a protected space and time for clients to support one another, to reflect and to apply cognitive and communication skills in a group setting, the Mood Management Group provides a ‘normalizing’, psychoeducational and strategy focused approach. The group process of sharing experiences and reflecting on how learning in rehabilitation may apply to oneself or others is still important, but is less central than in the Psychological Support Group. Practically, it enables clinicians to share a greater amount of information with clients than possible in individual sessions. As a result of this group, it is hoped that clients have a greater understanding of their own and others' emotional goals, challenges, strengths and strategies, and can share perspectives and develop self-awareness. This aims to empower individual clients so the group members can support each other more effectively.

Aims of the group

In the Centre policies and procedures, we describe the aim of the group as follows: