Mental Health Awareness Week | ProReal Free Live Workshops

ProReal are proud to support Mental Health Awareness week (10-16 May 2021) by offering a series of free, live webinars based on the recommendations of Mental Health Foundation, to protect and improve your mental health and wellbeing.

During each workshop, participants will be invited to join our virtual world for a guided and reflective practice, hosted by a trained ProReal facilitator. You can gain access with your laptop, desktop computer or iPad/tablet - take a look at the video below for an idea of what to expect.

Relationships are built on more than just words.

At ProReal, we recognise the importance of listening.

That’s why when you ask us for technology that allows you to express your ideas, explore your creativity and communicate with others, we make sure to provide an immersive platform that does just that.

With this in mind, we’ve been busy working on some upgrades that will enhance your ProReal experience and make your life a little easier.

Getting to the heart of the matter

When our team first found about CleverPoint we were intrigued – they combine two of our interests (virtual reality and biometric feedback) in a single piece of technology.

In the last few years, we have been exploring options for how to measure heart rate variability (HRV) whilst using ProReal. HRV is an important physiological marker, particularly of the body-mind connection and the activity of something called the vagus nerve. We’re particularly interested to see if we can understand more about ‘moments of change’ – those moments during ProReal sessions where new insights or a powerful emotional response may occur.

Supervision online – new process to provide supervision to many at the same time

We recently ran a live online session for a group of coaches who attended our presentation at “Coaching with the Brain in Mind: Where Neuroscience, AI and Tomorrow’s World Meet” - a brilliant conference organised by Henley Business School.

Each participant had their own World and were guided through a reflective process by our very own Development Director (and coaching supervisor) David Tinker.

An update from our users! - meet Stefan...

Stefan Reichel is Psychotherapist and Coach who recognises the need of digital technology in both mental health care and supporting business. Here is what his clients have said about using ProReal...

COVID 19 has caused disruption and change to people’s lives all around the world, but take this as an opportunity to ask what can I do? How can I alter my way of working to fit the current circumstances?

ProReal and Coaching @ Henley Business School Conference

Our team are busy preparing for a conference next week, Coaching with the Brian in Mind: Where Neuroscience, AI and Tomorrow’s World Meet as part of Henley Business Schools calendar of events. More specifically the event is taking place on Tuesday 29th September and will be held virtually, running from 8am – 6:30pm.

Creative Communication at a time of change – an update from our users!

A little bit of a different take on the news section of our website, rather than hearing some news from us we thought we would share some experiences and knowledge from our existing ProReal users.

This is particularly important to share right now as therapists and mental health providers must navigate new and more progressive ways of working to tackle the rising demand for mental health support. Let’s listen to those who have already taken this step.

Helping the next generation of clinical psychologists to deliver digital healthcare

With a brief to experience and explore directions on how VR therapy technologies are shaping the future of remote mental health support, ProReal was delighted to partner with the University of Surrey in an interactive session to support Digital Mental Health Day.

With COVID-19 high on the agenda, discussions focussed on how mental health support online is more important than ever and how ProReal is uniquely placed to be able to offer an innovative, alternative solution to more traditional types of online consultations.

Collaboration with Interventions Hub

ProReal Ltd is very proud to announce a new collaboration with Interventions Hub, part of the Red Snapper Group, and a leading provider of online CBT interventions to rehabilitation services. ProReal will a add dynamic online self-help learning environment to complement the suite of thinking skills and behavioural change interventions which Interventions Hub provide.

ProReal @ NHS Expo 2019

A huge thank you to the team at Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust who took us to NHS Expo this year... the ProReal avatars were doing their bit to show how digital can help young people to flourish.

Digital Mental Health Day: 10th June 2019

To help prepare our future clinicians for this revolution, over 30 trainee clinical psychologists took part in the second annual Digital Mental Health Day at the University of Surrey on the 10th June. Students got ‘hands-on’ experience of technologies used to deliver online therapy, as well as an introduction to the professional and ethical issues surrounding their use. The day was led once again by Dr Alesia Moulton-Perkins, a senior teaching fellow in the Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences. Dr Moulton-Perkins gave an experiential workshop on delivering psychological therapy by video call. This was followed by Andrew Jackson and David Tinker from ProReal Ltd, industry leaders in the world of virtual reality therapy technology, who gave presentations allowing the trainees to experience the use of avatars and virtual world technology.

UCL climate scientists have been trained to brief policy makers

The goal of the training programme, designed and run by members of the UCL Policy Commission on Communicating Climate Science, was to equip Early Career Researchers with the insights and tools to develop and present their scientific knowledge in ways relevant to policy and decision-making. This in turn should lead to improved framing of their research activities to deliver greater value to society.

"Avatars in Therapy" Conference

On the 28th February 2019, ProReal Pioneers from MerseyCare NHS Foundation Trust, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust, South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust as well as a leading commercial organisation in probation services spent a day together in Liverpool.

The positive side of technology and young people’s mental health

We are so proud of our collaboration with Off The Record (Bristol)! So many good stories about using digital to support young people’s mental health…and here is the latest example:

ProReal at the MindTech Symposium 2018

ProReal have been a very proud supporter of the annual MindTech Symposium since its inception five years ago. This year was no exception – our team hot-footed it from the Royal Society of Medicine conference on the Monday, to the Symposium where we had a stand set up with our tablets and laptop and touchscreens. ProReal have had a presence at the event before, but this year felt different – we felt like we’d come of age; we were talking about our work in five NHS Foundation Trusts, and the considerable learnings from clinicians, service users and Global Digital Exemplar teams.

RSM - Digital Mental Health for Children and Young People

The ProReal Team were delighted to be asked to present at the recent Royal Society of Medicine conference: Digital Mental Health for Children and Young People organised. We were asked to present in one of the afternoon workstreams, as a provider of technology to the NHS and so that we could share our experience of working with young people and technology.

ProReal Present at Minds@Work Conference in London Docklands

Whatever your role, mental health in the workplace is your responsibility. It doesn't matter whether you are an HR leader concerned about your legal responsibilities for taking action on mental health issues, or whether you are a line manager or a leader thinking about creating psychologically safe teams, the issue is fast moving up the corporate agenda.

Digital Mental Health Day for Students

The world of mental healthcare is changing and the University is at the forefront of these developments. According to the recent UK Government taskforce, technology will play a critical role by expanding access to digital services we enable more people to receive effective care and provide greater accessibility and choice.

ProReal v.3.3

Thank you for all the feedback and ideas following the changes we made earlier in the year. We are proud to announce the latest changes - ProReal v.3.3 - designed to improve client’s access and early experience.

Remote Learning Sets

ProReal Learning Sets quickly build trust, access insight and support personal change.

Taking Your Team Meetings to the Next Level

ProReal just went 'multi-user'! This exciting new capability gives disparate teams a virtual world venue in which to meet.

ProReal in Action, Creating Better Conversations

Better conversations. ProReal is now used by a number of organisations and when we look across these, the main benefit is all about facilitating better conversations in teams, particularly across geographically dispersed teams. We thought we'd share a few examples to bring this to life.

Avatars in a Changing Workplace

Avatar technologies and ProReal have been in the news recently, so we thought we'd share a couple of links with you.

Virtual-World Tech in Mentalization-based Treatment

Watch Penny Cutting and Dr Caroline Falconer on our recent webinar! In the webinar, Penny discussed the 20+ groups she held using ProReal to support people who are in the Day Treatment Programme at the Touchstone Centre at Bethlem Royal Hospital. Caroline also shared findings of the pilot, the results of which are to be published soon.

Join our Facilitators’ Community on LinkedIn

We’ve made it easier for those who are using our software to share their experiences, ideas, learnings and tips with a growing community of like-minded facilitators by creating the ProReal Facilitators Community on LinkedIn.

Case Study: How a 14 Year Old Boy with ASD used ProReal to Build ‘Meaning Bridges’

In January 2015 ProReal Ltd began a major research project supported by NHS England’s Small Business Research Initiative Healthcare (SBRI Healthcare) to evaluate the use of its virtual-world software with young people in school counselling...

Sharing our Knowledge at the Aspire HR Forum

ProReal was delighted to be part of the recent Aspire HR Forum in Cracow on 17th November 2016. The Aspire HR Forum is a quarterly conference of HR LD Directors, bringing together the most senior HR business leaders to explore, share and learn about the current trends, challenges and opportunities in the market...

ProReal Featured in HuffingtonPost

This article popped into our inboxes yesterday and it sparked a flurry of WhatsApp messaging between the ProReal team. Being a fairly PR-shy tech start-up (although Eileen our Head of Projects, Marketing and Ops is trying to change this!) we are really humbled when people we respect and admire talk about us...

ProReal Presents to MPs on Young People and Technology

On Tuesday afternoon we found ourselves sitting around a table in the Boothroyd Room in Portcullis House (opposite the Houses of Parliament) for the APPG for Young People and Social Technology. The All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) has politicians from all political parties and is chaired by Barry Sheerman, MP for Huddersfield. Their mission is to maximise opportunity and minimise risk for young people in the UK’s digital economy...

ProReal Technology Contributes to NHS Savings

SBRI Healthcare, an NHS England funded initiative to develop products that address unmet health needs, has released its 2016 annual report which shows how its programme has created a pipeline of innovations which could bring the NHS £1 billion of savings. The company’s SBRI Healthcare Phase 2 project ProReal Avatar Therapy for Young People is included in this annual report...

Research Shows Using ProReal Helps Reduce Psychological Distress

In January 2015 ProReal Ltd was awarded a Phase 2 contract by NHS England’s Small Business Research Initiative Healthcare to evaluate the use of ProReal software with young people...