Handicrafters often talk about how their hobby has helped them cope with testing times in their lives.

Now research has revealed just how therapeutic picking up a pair of needles can be.

A year ago, Linda Groom, of Bradford, suffered a breakdown she believes was triggered through stress. Her doctor signposted her on to the Isis Project.

Named after the Egyptian Goddess of rebirth and renewal, Isis is a group for women aged 18 and over in Bradford and Airedale who are recovering from a range of mental health problems.

It provides one-to-one help, focusing on issues such as confidence-building, assertiveness, cooking and eating, as well as knitting and sewing.

For Linda, picking up a pair of needles evoked fond childhood memories of wrapping wool around four nails on a wooden bobbin. Linda has been knitting for years, but undertaking an advanced course at Isis led to the realisation that knitting wasn’t simply a pastime.

“When I had my breakdown I lost the will to live basically, and when I went to Isis, I started picking up knitting needles again. It was like the road to recovery,” says Linda.

Through her own experience, Linda is confident that crafts, particularly knitting, can support people through tough times.

“You can lose yourself in crafts. It’s very relaxing and you forget about your problems,” she says.

She says as well as being therapeutic and relaxing, knitting brings the satisfaction of learning a new skill and the achievement of creation.

It also encourages social skills. Linda found knitting within the Isis project particularly helpful.

“It takes you out of yourself, you start talking and helping each other. You get to know each other in such a lovely atmosphere.”

Betsan Corkhill, director of community interest company Stitchlinks, set up in 2005, is involved in pioneering research focusing on how crafts, particularly knitting, can improve well-being.

Working with academics and clinicians, she is exploring its use to complement medical treatments in the self-management of long-term illness.

As a result, therapeutic knitting groups are being formally acknowledged by leading clinicians and academics for their benefits in mainstream healthcare.

Betsan tapped into the therapeutic benefits of knitting while working as a production editor for a range of magazines, including craft magazines. Her previous experience as a neurophysiotherapist gave her a greater understanding.

Betsan recalls receiving sackfuls of letters from people all over the world talking about the benefits of crafts on their well-being.

“With a medical background, I thought about it and wondered if I could develop it into a tool for helping people manage long-term medical conditions,” explains Betsan.

The focus on knitting came through her neurological background. There is a suggestion that, because it is a two-handed movement, knitting may be more beneficial than other crafts.

“We know that the mid-line of the body is significant to the brain, but we don’t know precisely why at the moment,” she says.

Betsan explains that the more capacity of the brain you can occupy with a two-handed activity such as knitting, the less capacity you have to focus on issues such as pain and depression. Becoming more creative through taking up crafts offers transferable skills into other areas of life.

“The other thing about knitting is it is very rhythmic and repetitive,” adds Betsan.

She says it can enhance the release of serotonin in the brain and can help to ease stress.

“There is always something new to learn, and earning a new skill on a regular basis is good for the brain,” she says.

Stitchlinks has enabled Betsan to explore the benefits further.

“I realised there was something really important that could change the way we look at long-term illness and also how we manage life and life’s problems.

“It is a way of managing stress and managing change that is part of normal life. If you don’t manage it on a daily basis, you’re storing up problems for the future,” says Betsan.

“The big difficulty is getting funding for any projects. We have gone a long way and everything has been done on a voluntary basis.”

Having organised her first knitting conference last year at Bath’s Scientific and Literary Institution, Betsan is making great strides to get the benefits of knitting known worldwide.

The conference attracted global attention from countries such as Chile, America and Australia. In addition, Stitchlinks has had a paper published in the British Journal for Occupational Therapy after a survey it put out showed that 81 per cent of people with depression felt happier when knitting.

At a time when the NHS is already stretched, there is a question whether crafts such as knitting could help alleviate the strain.

Dr Frances Cole, who established the award-winning Pain Rehabilitation Programme in Bradford in 1996, is keen to promote the benefits of knitting.

She says the benefits are two-fold. Knitting, she explains is a soothing process particularly for people living with long-term pain and there is a thought that practising this soothing skill encourages the body to produce its own pain-relieving drug.

Dr Cole says knitting also helps to synchronise the brain so it is more “in tune”, and she is encouraging the establishment of small knitting groups in the community.

“People who have got pain think they can’t knit for two hours, but they can knit for two minutes and stop and have a chat,” she says.

“It isn’t a cure – it’s about helping oneself feel more content, more soothed, more in touch with people who are doing similar things to cope.”

For details about the Isis project, visit isisproject.co.uk. For more about Stitchlinks, visit stitchlinks.com.