It has been over a month since Nepal was struck by a 7.8 magnitude earthquake on 25 April 2015, which was followed by another earthquake of 7.3 magnitude on 12 May 2015.
UCT’s Professor Crick Lund, director of the Alan J Flisher Centre for Public Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry and Mental Health, believes the inclusion of specific mental health targets in the new United Nations Sustainable Development Goals is a major breakthrough in the global effort to get mental health on the development policy agenda.
The fourth annual meeting of PRIME Research Program Consortium organized by Public Health Foundation of India and Sangath in Bhopal, stressed on the urgent need to implement the integrated mental health care plan comprising packages for delivery in primary and maternal health in Low and Middle Income countries, especially India, where Mental health services is an neglected area which needs immediate attention from the government, policymakers, and civil society organizations.
A report prepared by Mary De Silva and Jonty Roland titled “Mental Health for Sustainable Development” was recently launched at the UK Houses of Parliament. The report highlights the importance of mental health care in planning for development and was published by the Global Health and Mental Health All-Party Parliamentary Groups.
People living with mental illness may act in ways that increase their risk of HIV infection. Equally, persons living with HIV/AIDS, and more so, pregnant mothers, are highly vulnerable to developing depression and other mental illnesses. A number of projects led by the University of Cape Town are working on integrating mental health services into HIV, primary and maternal health care.
With a week to go before the globe commemorates World Mental Health Day, the PRogramme for Improving Mental health carE (PRIME) places mental health on the agenda of the Third Global Symposium on Health Systems Research #HSR2014, which was just completed in Cape Town (30 September – 3 October 2014).
Mental health leaders and advocates gathered in Geneva, Switzerland this past week as the “Preventing Suicide, A Global Imperative “report was publicly released by the World Health Organization (WHO) after the WHO launched implementation discussions of the Global Mental Health Action Plan adopted by the United Nations 66th assembly last year.
The PRogramme for Improving Mental health carE (PRIME) has recently published research findings regarding the acceptability and feasibility of using task sharing approaches to deliver mental health care in low and middle-income countries. Task sharing involves the delivery of mental health care by general health workers (including doctors, nurses and community health workers), who are trained and supervised by mental health specialists in routine health care delivery systems.
More than 13% of the global burden of disease is due to mental illness, of which 75% of people affected by mental illness live in Low and Middle-Income Countries (LMIC). According to World Health Organization (WHO), up to 4 out of every 5 people with mental illness in low resource settings go without mental health care.
PRogramme for Improving Mental health carE (PRIME) is a research initiative established to design ways to integrate mental health care services into primary health care (PHC).
Fifty-eight year old Maya Devi Sharma (name changed) a permanent resident of Chitwan is a mother of two daughters and a son. While both her daughters were sent off on their marriage, she is currently living with her son, daughter-in-law and two grandchildren. Few years before, she lost her husband due to chronic illness he had had.
Armed with 17 years of experience as a health worker in the public health sector, Bharat* recently completed a training program with TPO Nepal through PRIME, which has broadened his perspective and helped him to better respond to patients with mental illness.
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