Long Term Conditions

The LUNA Project

http://www.thelunaproject.org.uk/

The LUNA (Learning to Understand Needs and Abilities) Project is a small charity that aims to improve the awareness of young people living with long term health conditions and the support that they receive, particularly from peers. It stemmed from the realisation that many young people struggled to talk to their friends about their health or that often they felt that peers didn’t understand. The group is run entirely by young people, with people participating and volunteering from across the country, many with personal connections to the issues that the LUNA Project deals with.

To try and raise awareness and support young people the LUNA Project runs a number of projects. The LUNA Project runs workshops in schools and youth groups with all ages, which involve interactive tasks that are designed to promote empathy, communication and introduce children to the topic of disability in young people. We also run a blog and create resources with current projects including

  • The ‘Me and My Friends to You and Yours’ series in which different young people explain how their condition affects them physically and emotionally and what friends can do to help, often with a friends perspective running alongside. We currently have over twenty entries in this project and are always looking for more contributions.

  • Resources around transition between services and managing appointments how to communicate effectively with your doctor. This is a new project for which we are actively looking for both young people and health professionals to get involved with.

  • Online learning resources. In response to COVID-19 making visitors in schools challenging we have begun to create ‘online learning’ tasks for a variety of ages that hopefully address some of the same topics as in our workshops. These have only been limitedly reviewed unlike our face to face workshops so any feedback would greatly appreciated.
    You can find out more and access online learning materials and other resources at http://www.thelunaproject.org.uk/ . Contact email: thelunaprojectuk@gmail.com