Umea

Report by Kristina Lindgren

Our open meetings for voice hearers in Umea, in Vasterbotten, in the North of Sweden, started in October 2005.

We were helped and inspired by the voice hearing groups in Skelleftea and Stockholm. Ami Rohnitz and Siv Wetterberg (who also had helped the group in Skelleftea get started) travelled up to Umea to tell us about their experiences from Stockholm.

The meetings in Umea were made possible thanks to contributions of money and interest from the city and psychiatric care and support, as well as from the users’ and relatives’ organisations RSMH-Umeå (local part of the National Community for Social and Mental Health) and IFS-Umea (local part of the national Schizophrenia Society — Schizofreniforbundet).

There is a host-group consisting of interested people from mental health professions and users’ organisations, the members of which host the meetings (one host each time). But in the future we hope the meetings will be held exclusively by voice hearers themselves.

During the first year we had the meetings once a month, and started them by eating soup together early in the evening. But this year, 2007, we have a meeting every other week in the afternoon (every other Wednesday, 15-17) and simply start them with coffee and a sandwich — free of charge for the participants. And we gather at Karnhuset, an activity house, run by the two organisations RSMH and IFS.

Information is spread to psychiatric care and support units frequently, reminding about the meeting coming up next. (See attachment our meetings calendar for this spring term.)

Öppen självhjälpsgrupp för Rösthörare i Umeå

Contact with us can be made through:

Kristina Lindgren (voicehearer), IFS (Schizofreniforbundet): E-mail: [email protected]

Mobile: 0046-73-599 58 78

Dorothy Olofsson, Karnhuset, RSMH E-mail: [email protected]

Phone:0046-90-16 14 08

Maine Lundberg, Center for Social psychiatric Information in Vasterbotten E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: 0046-90-785 64 85; Mobile: 0046-70-58 64 63

Margareta Nyberg, the psychiatric clinic, University Hospital, Umea E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: 0046-90-785 64 85

Anna Boström, Socialpsychiatric services, Umea, E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: 0046-90-352 58

Barbro Rosenqvist, Socialpsychiatric services, Umea, E-mail: [email protected]

Phone: 0046-90-16 44 10

As for myself, now and then, I speak at conferences, courses for university students and professionals (e.g. social-workers and workers within mental health care) and for people in general, I often talk about my voice-hearing and inform about our meetings for voice-hearers in Umea as well as about Intervoice.