The World Health Organisation guideline on Mental Health Treatment was adopted during a 3 day forum by officials of the Ministry of Health and Social Welfare and the Mental Health Leadership and Advocacy Programme (MHLAP) held at NaNA conference hall 14th December, 2015.
It was geared towards customising and adopting the WHO Mental Health Gap Action Programme Intervention Guide.
Dawda Samba, country facilitator of MHLAP, said the WHO programme is a guideline for health workers at hospitals, health clinics and primary healthcare facilities in the communities.
He said it is important that mental health patients are taken care of wherever they are and that is why The Gambia government established a psychiatric hospital, Tanka Tanka.
Similarly, the government has provided scholarships to train psychiatric nurses to higher levels but the problem is, "most of the trained ones do not reach out to psychiatric patients in the rural areas".
"So what we are doing is to develop a treatment guide that the community health nurses, the state enrolled nurses, and the registered nurses and other doctors at communities and other health facilities can use to treat mental health patients," Mr Samba said.
The WHO tool, Mental Health Gap Action Programme Intervention Guide, is a simplified treatment guideline that many countries have adopted for mental health.
He said the guideline was developed based on research in developing and developed countries in Africa especially sub-Saharan Africa and other middle and low-income countries.
He said that when the guideline is ready for implementation in The Gambia, MHLAP is going to work with the Ministry of Health to print 500 copies for the ministry to distribute within its health facilities.
"Every single health facility will have a mental health treatment guideline," he said, adding that early next year, they are going to train 20 health workers that will provide extra training to others.
BY: Biram S Jobe BB
It was geared towards customising and adopting the WHO Mental Health Gap Action Programme Intervention Guide.
Dawda Samba, country facilitator of MHLAP, said the WHO programme is a guideline for health workers at hospitals, health clinics and primary healthcare facilities in the communities.
He said it is important that mental health patients are taken care of wherever they are and that is why The Gambia government established a psychiatric hospital, Tanka Tanka.
Similarly, the government has provided scholarships to train psychiatric nurses to higher levels but the problem is, "most of the trained ones do not reach out to psychiatric patients in the rural areas".
"So what we are doing is to develop a treatment guide that the community health nurses, the state enrolled nurses, and the registered nurses and other doctors at communities and other health facilities can use to treat mental health patients," Mr Samba said.
The WHO tool, Mental Health Gap Action Programme Intervention Guide, is a simplified treatment guideline that many countries have adopted for mental health.
He said the guideline was developed based on research in developing and developed countries in Africa especially sub-Saharan Africa and other middle and low-income countries.
He said that when the guideline is ready for implementation in The Gambia, MHLAP is going to work with the Ministry of Health to print 500 copies for the ministry to distribute within its health facilities.
"Every single health facility will have a mental health treatment guideline," he said, adding that early next year, they are going to train 20 health workers that will provide extra training to others.
BY: Biram S Jobe BB