The project aims to promote the well-being of young people (17-24 years old) with mental disorders using a community and peer-to-peer approach based on the performing arts, which is integrated with the health facility of ULSS 9 of Verona. A group was set up with young people with different pathologies who, under the guidance of Fondazione Aida operators, ran theatre and movement courses with about ten young people. The project starts from a shared reflection between ULSS 9 of Verona and Fondazione Aida ets on the need for a community approach of a cultural kind that integrates health care in order to improve the well-being of young people aged between 17 and 24 suffering from mental disorders.

The project aims to achieve the following objectives:

•  Increasing social contacts also among peers; reducing isolation and social withdrawal;

•  Enhancing relational and communicative-expressive skills;

• Increasing one's self-esteem and greater knowledge of oneself and one's abilities, one's emotionality;

• Releasing unexpressed energies and targeting aggression and/or shyness along constructive lines;

• Discovery and development of old and new expressive and communicative skills;

• Greater awareness of one's own body and physicality: voice, space, movement.

The theatre workshop is based on theatrical actions, movement games, improvisation games, to which were also added moments of participation in cultural initiatives in the city.

ULSS9 is the Public Health Department in Verona. ULSS 9 follows approximately 1,300 young patients each year with the Territorial Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatry Service: with the Adolescent Team (up to 18 years) and with the Adult Mental Health Services (19-24 years).