The Mental Health Service Users Association Ethiopia (MHSUA) is an association of mental health care users in Ethiopia. The key issues that the MHSUA seeks to address are to increase community awareness about mental health, reduce stigma and support people with lived experience to live in dignity, empower service users and their families to be their own advocate in the development and improvement of mental health care and advocate for rights-based approach to mental health care.
Mission statement
MHSUA strives to ensure that persons with lived experience in Ethiopia are engaged meaningfully in the health care system focusing on human rights, empowerment, recovery and peer support.
Summary of relevant work
MHSUA core areas are:
Collective voice for service users’ interests and needs
Peer support and empowering service users
Provide inputs to improve mental health care in terms of quality, accessibility, appropriateness
Advocate for better awareness of mental health: service users, care givers, health professionals, policy makers, government, development partners
Promote the rights of service users and participate in mental health legislation