Good mental health is integral to human health and well being. A person’s mental health and many common mental disorders are shaped by various so...cial, economic, and physical environments operating at different stages of life. Risk factors for many common mental disorders are heavily associated with social inequalities, whereby the greater the inequality the higher the inequality in risk.
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Psychatry & Pediatrics
Chapter I.3
Miscellaneous
Chapter J.4
In the last quarter century, several projects emerged to reform mental health services in Latin American and Caribbean countries. Some did not survive the difficulties that inevitably arise in processes of change, and ended up disappearing before th...e intended changes could be introduced. Others, however, as shown in this publication, were able to overcome difficulties and meet intended objectives, effectively transforming the structure and quality of services. All these projects, including the many that did not survive, were part of one of the richest experiences in the transformation of mental health care worldwide - the experience of mental health reform in Latin America and the Caribbean
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Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world, was devastated by an earthquake in 2010. The disaster uncovered the realities of a non-existent mental health care system with only ten psychiatrists nationwide. Attempts were made to assess the incr...eased prevalence of mental illness, likely due to the trauma to which many were exposed. Several interventions were carried out with aims to integrate mental health into primary health care services. The interplay between socio-cultural beliefs and health (both mental and physical) in Haiti has been widely commented upon by both foreign aid and local caregivers. Observations frequently highlight barriers to the willingness of patients to seek care and to their acceptance of biomedicine over traditional Vodou beliefs. The perception of Haitian beliefs as barriers to the availability and acceptance of mental health care has intensified the difficulty in providing effective recommendations and interventions both before and after the earthquake. Argued in this review is the importance of considering the interactions between socio-cultural beliefs and mental health when developing models for the prevention, screening, classification and management of mental illness in Haiti. These interactions, especially relevant in mental health care and post-disaster contexts, need to be acknowledged in any healthcare setting. The successes and failures of Haiti’s situation provide an example for global consideration.
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Introduction
Capter A.1
Ethics and international child and adolescent psychiatry
International Journal of Mental Health Systems December 2011, 5:3
Community mental health programs in low-income countries face a number of challenges. Using a case study methodology developed for ...this purpose, it is possible to compare programs and begin to assess the effectiveness of diverse service delivery models
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Universal health coverage ensures everyone has access to the health services they need without suffering financial hardship as a result. In December 2012, a UN resolution was passed encouraging gove...rnments to move towards providing universal access to affordable and quality health care services. As countries move towards it, common challenges are emerging -- challenges to which research can help provide answers.
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A guide to promote health systems strengthening to achieve universal health coverage.
The classification of digital health interventions (DHIs) categorizes the different ways in which digital and mobile technologies are being used to support health system needs. Historically, the di...verse communities working in digital health—including government stakeholders, technologists, clinicians, implementers, network operators, researchers, donors— have lacked a mutually understandable language with which to assess and articulate functionality. A shared and standardized vocabulary was recognized as necessary to identify gaps and duplication, evaluate effectiveness, and facilitate alignment across different digital health implementations. Targeted primarily at public health audiences, this Classification framework aims to promote an accessible and bridging language for health program planners to articulate functionalities of digital health implementations.
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This briefing note summarises key mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) considerations in relation to the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak.
This document sets out the preparedness and response plan of the Nigerian Primary Health Care System for COVID-19 Acute Respiratory Disease. It outlines the planning scenarios, key areas of work and priority activities required for the Primary ... class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">Health Care Sector to quickly scale up its core capacity to prevent, quickly detect, characterize and efficiently respond, in a coordinated manner to the COVID-19 pandemic. These include guidelines for the setup and operationalization of COVID-19 response platforms at the national and state levels, guidelines for the provision of PHC services during the pandemic to minimize transmission in PHCs as well as guidelines for preparedness and response of PHC Centres and communities for COVID-19 case detection and response.
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Men are less likely than women to seek help for mental health issues and are much more likely to commit suicide. This scoping review examined recent evidence published in English and Russian on the role of socially constructed masculinity norms in m...en’s help-seeking behaviour for mental health issues. The key sociocultural barriers to men’s help-seeking pertaining to masculinity norms were identified as self-reliance, difficulty in expressing emotions and self-control.
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The aim of this guidance is to enhance the capacity of health care facilities to protect and improve the health of their target communities in an unstable and changing climate; and to empower ...class="attribute-to-highlight medbox">health care facilities to be environmentally sustainable, by optimizing the use of resources and minimizing the release of waste into the environment. Climate resilient and environmentally sustainable health care facilities contribute to high quality of care and accessibility of services, and by helping reduce facility costs also ensure better affordability. They are, therefore, an important component of universal health coverage (UHC).
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This paper reviews the effects of vertical responses to COVID-19 on health systems, services, and people’s access to and use of them in LMICs, where historic and ongoing under-investments heighten vulnerability to a multiplicity of ...tribute-to-highlight medbox">health threats. We use the term ‘vertical response’ to describe decisions, measures and actions taken solely with the purpose of preventing and containing COVID-19, often without adequate consideration of how this affects the wider health system and pre-existing resource constraints.
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BMJ Global Health2020;5:e002014. doi:10.1136/bmjgh-2019-002014
Technical Note
Recently, the approach to hazardous events has undergone a considerable shift, away from reactive activities focused on managing and responding to events and towards a more proactive process of emergency and disaster risk management (DRM). The ultimate goal of this shift in focus is ...to prevent new and reduce existing disaster risks, a process known as disaster risk reduction (DRR), while strengthening individual, community, societal and global resilience.
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