About GSPA & WHIS

What this is

This is the official learning home of the GSPA Social Prescribing Link Worker programme — a full workforce development pathway covering the role, the competencies, supervision, the portfolio of evidence, career pathways and specialist tracks.

The programme is led by GSPA (the Global Social Prescribing Alliance) and delivered on WHIS Academy, the learning platform from WHIS (the World Health Innovation Summit). It is designed to be used worldwide — by individual link workers, their supervisors, the organisations that employ them, and multidisciplinary colleagues alongside whom they work.

About GSPA

GSPA — the Global Social Prescribing Alliance — brings together social prescribing practitioners, researchers and partner organisations around the world to share evidence, build capacity, and grow the social prescribing workforce globally. GSPA is the authoritative voice on the SPLW role and the curator of this programme.

About WHIS

WHIS — the World Health Innovation Summit — was established in 2015 to improve health and wellbeing outcomes through innovation, education and partnerships across communities and the workforce. WHIS builds and operates the academy platform that delivers the GSPA programme to learners worldwide.

About the programme

Social prescribing is a way of connecting people with community-based services, groups and activities that meet practical, social and emotional needs that affect their health and wellbeing. It works particularly well for people with long-term conditions, mental health needs, isolation, or complex social circumstances that medical services alone cannot resolve.

Our roadmap

Designed to help link workers at every stage of their career:

Key skill categories

• ✔Practical knowledge — digital skills, documentation, outcome tools
• ✔Working with people — empathy, communication, trauma-informed practice
• ✔Cross-sector collaboration — system navigation, teamworking, referrals
• ✔Health & wellbeing support — holistic care, prevention, health equity
• ✔Professional & personal wellbeing — resilience, boundaries, supervision

🌐A global commitment

• Aligned with international best practice
• Rooted in lived experience and local insight
• Flexible across settings, systems and cultures
• Evolving with global health policy and innovation

Accessibility & content standards

We target WCAG 2.2 AA, plain-English content (reading age ~12), keyboard-first interaction and dark-mode support. If you find an accessibility issue, please tell us so we can fix it.

Contributing

The WHIS & GSPA programme grows through the practitioners who use it. If you'd like to contribute a case study, propose a specialist track (children & young people, mental health, financial inclusion, refugees and asylum seekers, hospital discharge, and more), or partner with us on regional adaptations, get in touch via WHIS or GSPA.