The Federal Government has funded the national roll out of SANE Australia’s free digital mental health program designed for adults experience complex mental illness and trauma, and their families, carers and kin.
SANE Australia’s CEO Rachel Green says the $27.3 million investment is the first of its kind globally and an enormous step forward in ensuring those living with chronic or severe mental health conditions have access to care.
“There’s around 5 million Australians living with complex mental health needs and at least 500,000 missing out on support services that could dramatically change the trajectory of their life,” says Ms Green.
“The need to find new ways of supporting this community has never been greater, and there’s strong evidence that digital mental health support services are just as effective as face to face services, more economical and rapidly scalable to overcome geographic or workforce challenges.”
Ms Green says that SANE Australia co-designed a guided digital recovery program in 2021 using “a small Government pilot grant”, and since then have grown their digital offering.
“Our services have now grown to encompass a stepped digital support offering, proven by independent evaluation to reduce symptom domination, improve quality of life, and importantly, empower individuals to have the knowledge, skills and confidence to build their own recovery journey,” she says.
“People with complex mental health issues, and their families and carers, have always faced significant geographic, socio-economic and stigma-based barriers to recovery, impacting their ability to live the same meaningful and productive life as everybody else.
“This historic investment in making our free services available nationally is testament to the willingness of this Government to explore new mental health support pathways and actively reverse the inequality in service access that this community has experienced for so long.”
The SANE Digital Psychosocial Recovery Program and Community is currently available in most parts of Australia and will be made nationally available for free from July 2025.
Support services include:
- Guided Recovery, a 14 week program of 1:1 recovery-focussed counselling or peer support.
- Semi-guided Recovery Club including online group session, tailored recovery resources and peer support.
- Self-guided Recovery Community where people can connect with peers within a safe, moderated environment.
SANE’s free support services are said to be delivered by specialist mental health workers and accessible via any internet-enabled device.
SANE is also providing free telephone support for those without internet access.
All SANE services are said to be accredited by the National Safety and Quality in Digital Mental Health Standards.
Please go to sane.org/get-support to check current availability and learn more.
