Getting involved in your community

There are so many reasons to get involved with your community. There are certainly many known outcomes that are positive for individuals and the communities themselves.

Outcomes found from community inclusion can include reduced loneliness and isolation, peer-to-peer support, increased social connections and keeping physically active. Getting involved in community activities can make people feel better about themselves and can support positive mental and physical health.

Often for people with multiple sclerosis (MS), there is a range of barriers that can be faced with getting out and involved in community activities.

Barriers can be different for each person with MS, however, things that often need extra consideration and planning include; physical access requirements, availability of accessible toilets or knowing there’s somewhere to sit to recover.

So, sometimes people with MS may need a bit of extra help just to be included. Help can be informal from friends, family and neighbours through to local groups, organisations and charities.

There are some great groups and projects that are accessible across the U.K. and as each community is different, with varied needs, each community project will be individual for each area. We want to make sure that the MS community knows about these groups and organisations and can make the most of them.

Community support

Within MS-UK’s care and support pages, we have some information on finding support in your community. We want you to know that there’s help if you need it.

With this information, we signpost to support across the home nations. It includes MS specific support from charities, independent groups and MS therapy centres. We talk about the support that charities often provide to local groups or branches such as Mind, The Scottish Association for Mental Health (SAMH) and Age UK.

We have information on grassroots community focused charities that support a wide range of needs and we give information to help find out what there is near you. We also talk about the variety of community wellbeing projects, from community garden schemes through to exercise referrals and knit and natter groups.

If finding and joining a group or community activity is difficult for any reason, whether it is arranging transport or even having the confidence to go out alone, within the web page we also give information about practical and hands-on help to find a group that is right for you.

We can help!

Our helpline team are here if you need us. We’re happy to work with you to find accessible activities or support in your community. You can give us a call on 0800 7830518, use the live webchat via our website or send us an email on info@ms-uk.org.