Self-Care Forum showcases its 2025 award winners

The Self-Care Forum has been celebrating its annual award winners and launched a new resource to mark National Self-Care Week (17-23 November). 

The charity showcased this year's Self-Care Awards 2025 winner and highly commended entries ahead of the national week, which has the theme Mind & Body. The PIF member said the awards reflected the week's theme by recognising initiatives that make self-care practical, inclusive, and sustainable for everyone. 

This year's overall winner was The Open University's Take Five to Age Well – a co-designed initiative blending digital and offline tools to support healthy ageing across the UK. The initiative was praised for its simple yet powerful approach to helping people adopt daily habits across five key areas: eat, drink, move, connect, and think. Since its 2023 pilot and 2025 national rollout, it has engaged over 5,000 participants and 500 partner organisations, demonstrating that self-care can be inclusive, low-cost, and highly scalable. The initiative has become a blueprint for preventative care and healthy ageing across the UK. Judges called it "amazing and important".

Highly commended for championing self-care

There were three Highly Commended entries in the awards: 

• School of Nursing and Midwifery at Queen's University Belfast – Embedding a culture of self-care in healthcare education – which judges said would be "valuable to see it replicated nationally". This initiative integrates self-care into healthcare education to tackle stress, burnout, and poor wellbeing among students and staff. Through a 12-week assessed module, a digital platform and peer-led support groups, it has reached over 2,000 users and trained 120+ peer leaders.
• Swansea Bay University Health Board – Virtual wrist fracture self-care initiative – which the judges said "showed great energy and demonstrated clear evidence of cost savings". Introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, this model empowered patients with minimally displaced wrist fractures to manage recovery at home. Assessed virtually and discharged with self-care guidance, patients reported high satisfaction, no surgeries required and annual savings of £13,500.
• Lansinoh Laboratories UK – C-section self-care recovery bundle – described by judges as an "effective collaboration between a commercial organisation and the NHS". This initiative supports postnatal recovery through Hydrogel Pads for incision care, a CPD-accredited training module for healthcare professionals and short, evidence-based prompts. There have been 1,200 professionals trained and 20,000 support units distributed.

New resource launched following research

A new resource all about staying well by moving more has been launched by the Self-Care Forum this week. The charity's new Moving More fact sheet was created especially for release during National Self-Care Week and comes after the forum's research revealed people were uncertain about public health recommendations, particularly those on exercise and alcohol. The resource brings together guidance from several authoritative sources, including the UK’s NHS, the World Health Organisation, and NICE (the National Institute for Health. Its purpose is to help people understand exactly how much exercise - and what types of activities - are needed to keep healthy. The Self-Care Forum hopes the fact sheet will be used in surgeries, clinics, pharmacies, and other settings where health professionals and advisers can use it during shared consultations with patients and service users. 

PIF is a partner of Self-Care Week and is hosting a webinar on 20 November highlighting how health information supports effective self care and self management. Find out more here.

Read more about the Self-Care Awards 2025 on the Self-Care Forum website here.

Find the new Moving More resource on the Self-Care Forum website here.