Geographic Area: Global

Expanding mental health training and treatment in child and adolescent mental health in Vietnam

Engaged in early relationship-building with Can Tho University of Pharmacy and Medicine (CTUMP), and Can Tho Children’s Hospital (CTCH) in Can Tho, Vietnam to develop training, research, and clinical service delivery models for psychiatry and mental health in the region.

As is true throughout Southeast Asia, persons with mental illness in Vietnam suffer from stigmatization and under-resourced care. But things are changing. Vietnam is experiencing rapid economic expansion and, concurrently, attitudes about caring for individuals with mental illness are shifting. There is a developing awareness of children’s and adolescents’ mental health needs, and illness. UW faculty are working with the leadership at CTMUP to expand its capacity to provide mental health care in general psychiatry and in pediatrics, assisting community psychiatrists to update their knowledge, and guiding the leadership at the new Children’s Hospital to develop mental health programs.

citiesRISE

citiesRISE is a global platform committed to transforming the state of mental health policy and practice in cities and beyond to meet the mental health needs of populations across the world. To achieve significant, measurable improvements in mental health – especially among young people – citiesRISE is scaling up proven methodologies and tools and harnessing the skills and energy of experts and communities. Our vision is a world in which cities enable young people to grow up, develop resilience, and lead productive lives through mainstreaming mental health across sectors.

citiesRISE proposes a multi-component model for transforming youth mental health in cities around the world, centered on youth mobilization, scale-up of evidence-informed interventions that address the dimensional aspects of mental health (maintaining wellness through mental health promotion and preventive interventions, early intervention for youth at risk, and access to quality care for young people in need of mental health services); appropriate and innovative use of technology to support mental health, and transformation of specialist practice for community orientation and youth-centered focus. 

mHealth in West Africa: developing an evidence-based psychosocial intervention toolkit

There is a shortage of skilled mental health providers in Ghana. Due to the prevalence of traditional faith healers, coupled with the established infrastructure that faith healers in Ghana have, global mental health leaders have argued that these paraprofessionals may be leveraged as conduits of basic illness management strategies.

This study aims to: 1) Employ user-centered mixed-method rapid ethnographic data collection strategies to conduct a targeted needs assessment, and 2) Distill and integrate findings from all data sources to identify content and usability requirements for a human-centered, culturally/contextually-informed multi-media mHealth toolkit for healers.