Wellness Recovery Model

WRAP: Wellness Recovery Action Plan
The Recovery Model is a developed approach in helping patients with mental illness. Before the advent of various Recovery Model, there wasn’t much available to treatment or modalities when it came to helping patients recover from mental disorder, apart from the traditional medical approach. The medical approach was very focused on the treatment of the symptoms exhibited by the mentally ill person, rather than the whole person. Having roots in substance-abuse treatment programs, the Recovery Model, more specifically, the Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP), focuses on healing the patient holistically, educating them the coping skills as well as other techniques to help them deal with everyday stress that

The first step in achieving recovery through WRAP is to develop a wellness toolbox, which is a list of skills and tools to help the patient cope. The nurse will have a big role in helping the patient identify their strength or weaknesses, as well as helping them identify their support system. Some patient respond better to alone time, so the nurse might suggest journaling, listening to music, exercising, others need social interaction, so suggesting their join a peer group, team sport, or talking to a support person might be better for them. In order to help keep the patient’s autonomy during times of crises, the WRAP has 5 other steps on the road to recovery, including a daily maintenance list, which is a three-part list describing the patient’s feelings, listing a set of tools from the wellness toolbox they are going to utilize that day to maintain their wellness, and then a simple to do list. This type of strategy helps to keep the patient accountable, and as nurses, it is our responsibility to encourage the patients to follow and maintain certain standard to ensure they are compliant to their recovery model. Triggers, warning signs, and crisis planning are the components of the process, and require interdisciplinary work from the patient, nurse, doctor, counselor and other support staff. As with every human being, stress is a normal part of life. How we cope with those stressors is the difference between mental illness and mental wellness. With patients with substance-abuse issues, their coping mechanism is their substance of choice. So it is important to identify those stressors early on, identify early warning signs, look for inevitable situations where the patient feels like everything is falling apart, and most of all, prevent them from using. This is best achieved by following the model