An exciting journey along recent innovations and developments in education, and a plea for a shift in the teaching/training approach in the global mental health.
Introduction:
The problem: All low income countries face a huge shortage of mental health care staff. There are even countries with no or only one psychiatrist and some without any specialized mental health care provider. That’s why capacity building in this sector is one of the main challenges.
photo from CORDAID mental health capacity building session in Haiti, 2011
But most NGOs and education institutes in this field still have a strong ‘bricks and mortar’ and 1.0 education approach, where there is a one-way dissemination of knowledge from teacher/trainer to student/health worker with books/manuals and lectures/slides. Where scaling up capacity building means distributing more manuals/books and the deployment of more trainers and tutors.
I don’t think we can solve the immense workforce gap in mental health if we keep on focusing on this 1.0 education.
Continue reading →
The GETHealth Summit (Global Education and Technology Health), 6-7 February 2013 in the United Nations, New York City, aimed ‘to bridge the health workforce gap in developing countries through new partnerships between innovators in Global Health Education and Information 
Technology. The Summit brought together leaders in health, education and IT to discuss and develop initiatives designed to empower providers in the most resource-limited communities in the world’. It were very inspiring and entertaining days: About 150 optimistic and dedicated people from around the World, a bulk of knowledge and experience and plenty of successes and recommendations (and a few failures).
I would like to bring across the main messages from this summit in ’20 golden tips’: Continue reading →
What’s mobile health, text messages for life, text for change, Ushahidi, FrontlineSMS, Epysurveyor, M-Pesa? How does a SMS-computer interface work? How to send bulk messages, an automatic response SMS? And what do SMS polls and quizzes look like?
And what’s this got to do with Global Mental Health? Continue reading →
Introduction:
Although the developments in the new technologies (or ICT, information and communication technology) are leapfrogging and even difficult to keep up, the implementations of ICT in the global mental health sector seem still crawling. Continue reading →
What will be the most easy and most effective way to reach and train health workers in the field about mental health treatments? Now we have the WHO mhGAP Intervention Guide, but how to get this guide implemented in all the corners of the world? Printed on paper? Via the internet? Smartphones? SMS and voice platforms? Here’s an overview of what is possible and seems necessary. Continue reading →
By in2mentalhealth
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Posted in in2mentalhealth Blog Posts
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Also tagged capacity building, developing countries, distance learning, education, elearning, ict4e, LMIC, m4e, mental disorders, mental health, mhgap, mhGAP-IG, psychiatry, WHO
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Tanzania is one of the poorest countries in the world with an astonishing shortage in mental health care. And Tanzania hosted the big eLearning-Africa 2011 summit, with all modern cyber techniques exposed and discussed. Do this two facts merge? What can mental health in Tanzania gain with these new technologies in education?
Introduction:
This article is a result of my 7 day trip to Tanzania in May 2011. I attended the eLearning-Africa summit in Dar Es Salaam and visited several organizations in Tanzania in the field of mental health and education: Continue reading →
More then 239.000 extra mental health workers are needed in the South and only 54,5% of the low income countries have psychiatric training facilities! How to fill this gap?
In this article possible eLearning applications in 4 mental health capacity areas in low income countries are investigated. With figures, examples and links the current state of art will be presented. A conclusion will be given (‘Yes, it can’) as well as recommendations for the future.
Discussions, comments and additions are very welcome! Continue reading →
By in2mentalhealth
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Posted in in2mentalhealth Blog Posts
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Also tagged brain drain, capacity building, counseling, degrees, developing countries, distance learning, e-learning, education, elearning, LMICs, low income countries, medical education, mental disorders, mental health, mental illness, mhgap, nurses, psychiatrist, psychiatry, psychology
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Most people with mental disorders in low income countries receive no treatment at all for their mental illnesses. The new technologies, like the internet and mobile devices, can solve part of this so called treatment gap. In ’10 good reasons’ the benefits of ICT in this global health field are clarified. 1: ICT is booming business, 2: Saving costs, 3: Reaching people, 4: Anticipating on globalization, 5: Raising awareness and fighting stigma, 6: Empowerment and independence, 7: Capacity building, 8: Global knowledge sharing, 9: Bottom up and demand driven, 10: Standardized and easy access of info. Continue reading →
By in2mentalhealth
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Posted in in2mentalhealth Blog Posts
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Also tagged advocacy, developing countries, e-mental-health, ehealth, global, humanitarian aid, LMIC, mental health, mhealth, mhgap, new technologies, policies, psychiatry, stigma, web2.0
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in2mentalhealth 