Global Mental Health Unboxed #18
Your monthly newsletter on all things global mental health
23 May 2022
Dear readers,
Welcome to another edition of your favourite (I hope!) newsletter about global mental health events, news, job vacancies, resources and publications. I’m honoured to have your readership of this small project, and I appreciate your amazing feedback more than I can say.
These days I receive more and more contributions from readers who have something interesting to share here, so if you also have your piece to say, write to me at manolova.gergana@gmail.com.
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Yours,
Gergana
News and Notes in Global Mental Health
Here I share interesting pieces of information, announcements and news that have reached me in our field. I rely on your contributions as well - please share your news or announcements with me.
Wellcome teaming up with Fondation Botnar for a big study
A large request for proposals out of Wellcome is looking for bids on carrying out landscape analysis on mental health science, policy and practice in 22 countries around the world. This tremendous piece of work will be presenting thorough information on context, policy, mental health science and advocacy (including the role of people with lived experience) in countries of particular interest to Wellcome and Fondation Botnar, the Swiss philanthropic partner. Look up the full terms and timeline here.
Plos Medicine special issue on COVID-19 and global mental health
Two years and counting of pandemic have done a lot of damage on mental health around the world - so can we take stock of this yet? The special issue will attempt this task, looking specifically for papers on the impact on inequities in mental health, vulnerable populations, public mental health, life-course perspective on mental health consequences, health system responses to the increased demand and evaluations of policy interventions. Check out the full announcement and how to submit by 15 July here.
NIMH US on how to apply for funding
The National Institute of Mental Health in the US has been funding a lot of important global mental health work and it looks like they are dedicated to snagging even more promising applications - which is why they are running a series of webinars this year on how to apply for grants with them, including specifics around training and career development. Catch up to all the webinars and sign up here.
GenMH has launched a survey on mental health advocacy
Generation Mental Health has been working to create programs that benefit young mental health advocates of this generation. To learn further about how young people are making decisions in mental health advocacy, the organization has developed a youth survey (targeting those aged 15-35) to connect with current and aspiring advocates to understand their needs, gaps, and challenges. Definitely take part, because the implications will be far-reaching - the survey report will be made publicly available so that organizations working on youth mental health around the world can further develop their initiatives. Responses will also serve to inform future GenMH programs such as the Youth Mental Health Collective (being developed in collaboration with the MHPSS Collaborative), which aims to connect and empower youth interested in mental health to collaborate and lead mental health policy change, research, and innovation in their communities and beyond.
WHA to discuss global action plan on neurological disorders
The seventy-fifth World Health Assembly is taking place in Geneva this week. On the agenda is the intersectoral global action plan on epilepsy and other neurological disorders. If endorsed, as is highly likely, the plan will prescribe actions for countries and civil society to reduce the global burden of neurological disorders and improve lives of people living with them. Disclaimer: I worked a little bit on the plan (not the contents itself) and can say with certainty it is an excellent and comprehensive document. Read the draft here.
Events in Global Mental Health
The event calendar for 2022 is at globallyminded.org. Keep in mind that online events - and they are nearly all online - usually are announced shortly before they take place and I publish them on the website with only 2-3 days’ notice. I only publish some spotlights here.
2 June 2022 - Inaugural Global Mental Health Day by the University of Toronto Department of Psychiatry - it is always exciting to hear about another university featuring its global mental health work, and in the programme for the day there will be a focus on the Sustainable Development Goals and on careers in global mental health - a riveting topic for the readers of this newsletter, I should think.
16 June 2022 - Role of Peer Work in the Mental Health Field by the CARe Network - a discussion led by peer workers from Czechia, Estonia and Hungary is always worth listening to, considering the high burden of stigma around mental health and the aspirational mental health systems in these three countries. I hope to hear about their day-to-day experiences and their nuanced insights into the development of comprehensive mental healthcare which focuses on recovery.
Jobs in Global Mental Health
The jobs listed here might not be advertised as being in global mental health and the decision for including them is mine alone. Unless otherwise stated, I have found out about them through job sites, social media posts, other newsletters and so on, so I have no more information on them than publicly available and you should refer to those listed in the job ad.
No or minimum experience necessary
Live tweeter, Mental Health Elf, UK
PhD Studentship, University of York, UK (UK students only) - by 14 June
Child and Youth Mental Health Scholarship, Griffith University, Australia
PhD studentship, University College London, UK - by 31 May
Some experience (2-5 years) necessary
Research Manager - Lived Experience, Wellcome, UK - by 6 June
Grants Strategist, Happier Lives Institute, remote
Operations Manager, Happier Lives Institute, remote - by 6 June
Project Management Officer, Good Neighbours UK, Romania (3 months) - by 5 June
Project Manager of the East European Program, People in Need, Czechia
Lecturer in Social Science, Health & Medicine, King’s College London, UK - by 19 June
5+ years of experience necessary
Senior Researcher, Happier Lives Institute, remote
Trainer, MHPSS, International Medical Corps - by 1 July
MHPSS Specialist, Handicap International, France or Belgium - by 10 June
International Consultant for MHPSS & SRHR, UNPFA, remote - by 30 May
Technical Advisor MHPSS, International Rescue Committee, Germany
Resources in Global Mental Health
A section for various opportunities, databanks, information sources that may prove helpful.
OneHealth tool - economic evaluation and investment cases are part and parcel of the successful global mental health work, therefore even those of us who are not comfortable with economics should get to grips with the methodology. With the OneHealth tool it might even be fun. In the world of mental health it succeeds an older tool used specifically for costing the rollout of mhGAP trainings, but the added benefits of the tool are the health systems approach and the constant inflow of country-specific information on costing and epidemiology, maintained by the WHO. It is of course freely available and you can run all the scenarios you want, whether for your own interest or for the purposes of a planned study.
Publications in Global Mental Health
The selection of publications ultimately reflects my personal knowledge and preferences, but I have no intended bias. Feel free to send me publications you consider interesting or that you would like to be featured. I try to focus on articles that are free or open access.
Mental Health Gap Action Programme Intervention Guide (mhGAP-IG) for Child and Adolescent Mental Health in Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMIC): A Systematic Review - I confess to having a long-standing interest in mhGAP as an instrument for giving the necessary knowledge about mental health conditions quickly and reliably, and have been lucky to work on projects that implement it in various settings. One thing I’ve noticed is that the module on child and adolescent mental health from mhGAP-IG frequently gets axed off training of primary healthcare workers for whatever reasons. Does this reflect an artificial clinical division between child and adult mental health - or a genuine one in practice? Does it imply mhGAP-IG should branch off a separate guide specifically for child and adolescent mental health? These are questions that this article raises but admits they are beyond its scope. It is still valuable as an examination of how to properly conduct and document your mhGAP study, but I hope further work by the author answers “the need to document the reasons why the roll out of CAMH modules has often been excluded from the mhGAP-IG implementation process” and that soon enough we see more research with and on the child and adolescent module of mhGAP-IG. Research on bridging the treatment gap for child and adolescent mental health worldwide is now beyond ‘oversight’ and approaching the territory of ‘gross negligence’.
Special Series Introduction: Activist & Community Perspectives on Mental Health/Psychosocial Disability from the Global South - this series is only now beginning, but already it feels like rain on parched earth. While there are many activists in mental health and many academics in mental health out there, the crossover is rarely realized. That is to say, activist voices rarely show up in academic literature, and academics just as rarely show up at activist events. At least the one will be remedied to an extent with this promised collection of perspectives on mental health and psychosocial disability coming from voices outside the typically over-represented “Global North”. If you are interested in having your say, take a look at this piece: the editors of the series are ready to provide specific assistance with submission and authoring in order to make publications possible from those who usually do not have access to such a tribune. As a fan of oral histories, I especially like the “[explicit] support [of] an expanded view of ‘authorship’ that includes (co-) authorship of individuals with no or low literacy […] we encourage creativity, for instance the inclusion of advocates with low literacy through the use of oral interviews or dialogues”. Bookmark the link to the editorial, then, and keep going back to it; and if you want to read a specific article that you can’t access, don’t hesitate to contact the editors.
*Social media image courtesy of Pexels.
The Language Corner
This Language Corner relies on interactions with you, the readers, to build an entertaining little multi-way dictionary of global mental health terms. Needless to say, terms don’t always translate equally well and might evoke different emotions in the different languages.
Today we tackle an important and culturally distinct phrase in global mental health which can be difficult to translate from the English. How do you say “people with lived experience” in various languages?
French - personne ayant une expérience vécue
Chinese - 有生活經驗的人 [yǒu shēnghuó jīngyàn de rén] [lit. persons with life experience]
Russian - люди с психиатрическим опытом [lit. persons with psychiatric experience]
Spanish - personas con experiencia vivida
Bulgarian - хора с преживян опит
Please add the expressions from your own language below!
Just discovered this newsletter and as an upcoming researcher in global mental health, I find it to be a treasure! It's a brilliant, well-curated up-to-date resource on news and developments in the field all in one place! Simply brilliant.
Thank you so much for your initiative!!