Primary health organisation WellSouth commissioned an independent review of the Tōku Oranga Access and Choice Programme, focused on people with mild-to-moderate mental health and addiction issues.
Participants can self-refer to meet a health improvement practitioner, health coach or support worker without seeing a doctor or nurse first.
The programme is designed to be flexible — appointments can be one-off to ongoing.
The review from consulting firm Synergia said although a minority of people actually rated their wellbeing, feedback was positive.
"There are meaningful and measurable benefits as result of Tōku Oranga," the report said.
"The change in ... ratings between the first and last consultation shows statistically significant improvements in the domains of mental, physical and social health, giving a mean total health change of 8.32 points from 100."
The review looked at data from a sample of 13 practices with the programme, and 12 participants were also interviewed.
In a group of 765 people who had left the programme, the mean score people gave their overall health — including social, physical and mental health — upon entering was 53 out of 100.
By the time they left the mean overall rating was 61.3.
Mental health ratings among users improved the most among the categories, with the mean rating jumping from 47 to 58.
Those interviewed talked in "glowing terms" about the support they received, the report said.
Men were noted to be less comfortable seeking support, and stood to benefit from the normalising of mental health support.
"I think as a Kiwi bloke, we tend to close up a bit and not talk about our personal issues.
"It’s been nice to give my perspective and know that others could be looking at that and saying, ‘well, maybe if I ask for help, I can have something better’," one participant said.
Another participant who had gone to counselling appreciated the problem-solving approach of Tōku Oranga.
"It’s still got similar undertones of like, ‘come in, tell me how your week has been, tell me what you want to do’, but then there’s a bit at the end where it’s like,’ OK, so how are we doing with that?"’ she said.
Referrals to mental health brief intervention services in the sample practices had dropped by 38% compared with the year before the programme was introduced, the report said.
By comparison, those without it had seen a 7% increase.
However, the programme did not appear to affect the number of people being recommended for secondary mental health services.
WellSouth primary mental health clinical services manager Jodie Black said the findings of the report were a strong endorsement of the programme.
"The report confirms what we have been hearing and what our clinicians and practices experience: the Tōku Oranga Access and Choice service has a tangible impact on people’s lives, making preventative care more readily available," she said.
It was more immediate than other care, and because it took place in the general practice a participant was already used to, it felt more normal.
"This is a radical shift from usual delivery of mental health and wellbeing programmes and as the research confirms it’s really working, helping more people and filling a gap in the system."
At the time of the evaluation last year, 27 of WellSouth’s 81 general practices were taking part.
However, it is now provided by 48 general practices.
