‘Psycho-Social Update’ is a newsletter from the International Program of Psycho-Social Health Research IPP-SHR, Central Queensland University, circulated four times a year to an international audience of service providers, policy makers and academics with an interest in the human experience of serious illness. The aim of the newsletter is to translate the wealth of research findings available in the academic psycho-social health literature into lay summaries that can be useful for service delivery and health policy. The newsletter also showcases the diversity of excellent psycho-social program initiatives designed by practitioners and organisations to assist people to deal with the many challenges associated with serious physical and/ or mental illness. The newsletter celebrates the fact that psycho-social research is now a well established discipline that is ‘making a difference’ in the real world of health care.