Background:
Peer workers are an important and increasingly professionalised workforce within the Australian mental healthcare system (Byrne et al., 2021). Peer workers use their lived experience of distress, personal recovery, and use of mental healthcare services to support others navigating similar circumstances by forming mutually beneficial relationships (Stratford et al., 2016).

Peer-support offers many benefits to mental healthcare service users (Bellamy et al., 2017; White et al., 2020) and syntheses of qualitative studies suggest that peer workers themselves experience improved self-esteem, social contacts, and knowledge about their own mental health (Gillard et al., 2022). However, challenges such as poorly defined roles and stigmatising attitudes held by non-peer professionals may undermine these benefits, posing a risk to the wellbeing and retention of the peer workforce (Burke et al., 2018; Clossey et al., 2018).

Study aims and method:
Most studies investigating benefits and challenges associated with the peer-support role have occurred in North America or the United Kingdom (UK) (Gillard et al., 2022). Our study aims to understand the experiences of Australian peer workers to inform development of interprofessional practices that may best support this workforce.

In collaboration with a Peer Worker Reference Group (PWRG), we adapted the Experiences of Providing Peer Support Questionnaire originally developed by Burke et al. (2018) for the UK context. The PWRG provided recommendations to modify, remove, or add items to ensure its suitability for Australian peer workers. The adapted questionnaire was disseminated nationally as an online self-report survey, which additionally included validated measures of personal recovery, quality of life, and self-stigma.

Content/findings:
To date, 141 peer workers (61% women) have completed the survey. Most are employed in non-profit (37%) or government (31%) mental healthcare services in Victoria (42%) or New South Wales (16%).

Preliminary results indicate that peer workers derive personal enjoyment and satisfaction from the role (99%), new knowledge gained from peers (99%), and through making a valued contribution to others’ lives (98%). The most commonly endorsed challenges include stress associated with a role that is challenging (71%) and poorly defined or supported at one's workplace (67%), and pressure from non-peer colleagues to “stay well” (67%).

Updated findings will be presented, including analysis of the factors that contribute to peer workers’ quality of life, personal recovery, and self-stigma. Implications for psychologists working alongside peer workers will also be discussed.

The APS Disaster Response Network is a network of 1,000 APS Psychologists who are interested in providing pro-bono support to frontline and emergency workers, especially in the recovery process from disasters or emergencies. The DRN has chosen to work through partner organisations to deliver wellbeing care.

We present our experiences of delivering support through various health, emergency service, nonprofit, and other types of organisations that work in disaster-prone communities. The evidence base does not provide definite answers about how to support resilience of workers. This presentation posits that the best type of support matches the organisational culture and internal capacities. We present some case examples of how volunteer Psychologists might offer types of wellbeing support to organisations that fits their needs.