“We go. We make house calls. We build health systems. We stay.”
The Partners In Health (PIH) Cross-Site Mental Health Program supports mental health program development at all the PIH global sites. PIH’s work in mental health is unique in the field of global health for the ways we create and strengthen community-based, primary care, and hospital-linked mental health systems to provide mental health services for complex and co-morbid common and severe mental health conditions in settings where there are few to no services available. PIH has responded to humanitarian crises as opportunities to strengthen health systems to build back better following catastrophic events, demonstrating the feasibility of task-shared, locally adapted, collaborative, comprehensive and community-based services for the long term in “real-world” settings. Since 2009, PIH has created a substantial, measurable, innovative global mental health care delivery model that has the potential to be scaled up nationally in partnership with local communities, governments, and Ministries of Health.
- Clinical care, and the training, clinical supervision and mentorship needed to support it, as mental health care requires human beings who are prepared and ready for the difficult challenge
- Program management and technical advisement on optimal use of resources in context;
- Meaningful data collection with monitoring and evaluation, quality improvement, and research support
- Shared learning, knowledge sharing, and mutual support, both in person, and using technology with the Cross-Site Mental Health Learning Collaborative.
The Partners In Health Cross Site Mental Health team works in collaboration with local implementers across all 11of PIH’s sites to develop and strengthen mental health services within PIH’s primary care system. Below is a summary of ongoing work across the PIH sites:
|
Psychologists, social workers, nurses, physicians and Community Health Workers (CHWs) work through a task sharing model in collaboration with the MOH to integrate mental health care into primary care.
|
|
|
Psychologists and social workers integrate depression care for patients with Multi-Drug Resistant TB (MDR-TB) and are launching an innovative substance use intervention.
|
|
|
Lay counselors and providers deliver psychosocial interventions for integrated care for depression, MDR-TB, and provided crisis response support. PIH is leading Lesotho's technical working group to support development the first national mental health policy and strategic plan.
|
|
|
Close partnerships with community members, traditional healers and lay providers, and facility level providers strengthen the quality and reach of mental health services. Peers and caregivers lead psychosocial rehabilitation groups and PIH works with the MOH to influence policy.
|
|
|
Integration of mental health care in the Integrated Chronic Care Clinic (IC3) program, incorporating depression case-finding and treatment into HIV services, primary care, and maternal care. Psychologists and lay counselors provide group psychotherapy for maternal depression.
|
|
|
Community mental health workers deliver a psychotherapeutic intervention for depression and anxiety (WHO Problem Management Plus), conduct psychoeducation groups, and work with adolescents in the community. Community members promote restorative justice and gender equity via Women’s Circles. |
|
|
(The)Navajo Nation |
The Community Outreach and Patient Empowerment Program in Navajo Nation collaborates with key partners to increase access to mental health resources for community members and front-line workers.
|
|
SES has established innovative programming to identify, screen, refer, and treat people with a wide range of mental health conditions across diverse vulnerable populations, ranging from treating common mental health conditions, working with migrants, transgendered populations and women and children. |
|
|
Health center nurses deliver WHO’s PM+ intervention for depression and anxiety with supportive supervision from psychologists. Community-based mental health care is provided in rural public primary care system through mentorship, training, and supervision, psychotherapy, and psychosocial rehabilitation. |
|
|
Psychiatric and psychological care is integrated in the community, primary care, and district levels, including the national Sierra Leone Psychiatric Teaching Hospital. In partnership with the Ministry of Health, PIH-SL supported the development of the first psychiatry residency program in Sierra Leone at the renovated Sierra Leone Psychiatric Teaching Hospital (SLPTH) |
Watch this video, created by Partners in Health in celebration of World Mental Health Day 2017, and which encapsulates all the great work Partners in Health is doing to empower communities and improve mental health around the world.
800 Boylston Street, Suite 300
Boston MA 02199
USA
Partners In Health Sister Sites around the globe:
- Inshuti Mu Buzima (Rwanda)
- Companeros En Salud (Mexico)
- Zanmi Lasante (Haiti)
- Bo-Mphato Litšebeletsong tsa Bophelo (Lesotho)
- Socios En Salud (Peru)
- Partners In Health Liberia
- Partners In Health Sierra Leone
- Abwenzi Pa Za Umoyo (Malawi)
- Партнеры во имя здоровья (Russia)
- Community Outreach and Patient Empowerment, Navajo Nation, New Mexico; Rosebud Sioux Tribe, South Dakota (USA)
Collaborators
- Harvard Medical School, Department of Global Health and Social Medicine (USA)
- Columbia University (USA)
- District and National Ministry of Health in each country
- Grand Challenges Canada
- Abundance Foundation
- HGHI Burke Fellowship
- Many Voices Foundation
- One by One
- Grand Challenges Canada
- Johnson & Johnson
