In Barton Hill, a bleak enclave of inner-city east Bristol defined by poverty and overbearing blocks of council flats, many white males, especially the middle-aged, believe they no longer have a voice. A £50m regeneration scheme has unfolded around them – the flats spruced up, a makeover for public spaces – yet often they say they feel like outsiders in their own neighbourhood.

Enter Dave Martin, a support worker with the Wellspring Healthy Living Centre, a charity in the heart of Barton Hill, who has identified loneliness as the corrosive problem behind many of the men's issues. The most recent statistics – from 2010 – showed that the area had Bristol's highest number of incapacity claimants with mental health problems, and that they were the least likely to socialise.

Many locals believe the recent influx of Somali families get a better deal in terms of housing allocation and social provision. Tensions have grown.

Martin has been addressing men's mental health since Wellspring secured around £20,000 a year from two charitable trusts in 2009. "At first, we were seeing people one to one, referred by GPs and other health professionals. Then I thought of having a group – there were groups for women and children but nothing here for men," he says.

For those who turn up on Tuesday afternoons to gossip, cook, play Wii games – whatever they fancy – it is the weekly highlight. The first-floor kitchen at Wellspring is alive with the sound of banter. Slices of pizza are shared out. One or two work on an intricate balsa wood model aeroplane, others play cards.

"Sometimes, we just sit down and rant and rave," says Martin, who sees around 17 men a week. "Once every six weeks we go out on a trip. Over 12 weeks we put a life plan together and help to build their confidence so the men can start building up a social network outside the group."

Roger is typical of many of the regulars at the Time Out For Men group. "I used to run pubs and drank 20 pints a day, though stopped when I got fibromyalgia [pains and tenderness in the body]," he says. Roger also worked as a bus driver but health problems such as diabetes and a crumbling spine mean he can no longer manage a job.

Stuck in his maisonette, he says he found little to get up for. "I was sitting in there for weeks at a time – every day dissolved into the other. Coming here was the best thing I've ever done. You see people with the same problem of depression, and for some reason this group seems to work with the lads we have."

He draws on a cigarette and surveys Barton Hill from the balcony. "What they've done here is paint it over, tart it up. They haven't built a community," he says.

Tony knows all about being cut off. "There are thousands around here who don't see anyone for days, not until they cash their next giro. The idea of the group was to drag people out and get them in here. I've been coming two or three years – Dave [Martin] encouraged me."

A former council caretaker but now disabled, Tony still has ambition: "I'd like to start my own business … something like an information cafe or scoop and mix sweetshop," he says. As does Graham, a well-spoken graduate with a degree in conceptual art. "I'm a sculptor, and currently working on computerised 3D sculptures," he says. Following illness and family difficulties, Graham now lives on the 10th floor of a tower block. "You feel isolated: it's like a prison cell. I can go through the whole week without talking to someone. The group we've got here helps form a community."

Wellspring, which was funded by the neighbourhood regeneration scheme, tries to aid social cohesion by also running projects for newly arrived Somalis and Poles. But some members of the men's group feel the "Africans" get preferential treatment for public services. "I understand they're trying to build a new life here but the system is anti-English," says Tony. It is a view that Wellspring stresses it does not share.

The benefits of Time Out For Men are being quantified by researchers from the University of the West of England. Among 38 men who have been attending for three months or more, visits to GPs for various ailments fell by 34%. Almost all reported growing self-confidence and feeling less depressed. Most said they are starting to socialise more and feel part of their community.

Wellspring hopes that Time Out For Men will eventually become a service commissioned by the NHS. The final evaluation of the project will be published next year. "Basically, what Dave does is life coaching, though not in the conventional sense," says Wellspring's head of services Rhian Loughlin. "He isn't a therapist, a social worker or a counsellor. People like him are just good at what they do; they aren't a slave to any framework."

• Some names have been changed