Bringing knowledge and understanding, restoring hope

There is no doubt that Covid19 has been, and continues to be, a challenge to our friends in Uganda.  It was therefore with “double joy” that we have received news of an mhGAP training workshop that has just been successfully completed at Lubaga Hospital[1], on the western side of the capital, Kampala, and the second oldest hospital in Uganda.

Twenty-four hospital staff took part in the five day workshop between the 12^th and 16^th October, 2020.  The course was facilitated by senior psychologist Joshua Ssebunnya, a longstanding friend of Jamie’s Fund, and his colleagues. Using a variety of teaching techniques, they worked with doctors and nurses from across the hospital to enable them to diagnose and respond appropriately to a wide range of mental health conditions.

This was achieved through a mixture of teaching, group discussion and practical role-playing exercises.  Participants and hospital management rated the course a great success and noted that the participants, who were not mental health specialists, were “already feeling the importance of mental health …”  The report sent to Jamie’s Fund also noted that that the sessions were lively and that, in consequence, none of the participants dozed off!

In his closing remarks, the Hospital Executive Director thanked Jamie’s Fund for its support and expressed the hope that Lubaga Hospital will now set up a mental health unit within the hospital.  Already a WhatsApp Group has been set up to support those who were trained in this workshop and a Clinical Officer has been tasked to work with the Deputy Principal Nursing Officer to continue the roll-out of mental health care across the hospital.

The team at Jamie’s Fund are delighted with the success of this workshop and we are pleased to have been able to provide the funding.  The cost of each workshop varies depending on different factors (including whether or not it is residential) but the rough cost is around £4000 for the five days.  We believe this is money well spent, as the training of twenty or more clinical staff across a hospital can have a huge and disproportionate impact on the lives of many people.

Mental illness often presents in other departments such as A&E and maternity or as an apparently unrelated presentation at out-patients clinic. Without such training the diagnosis may be missed.  By training staff from these different clinical areas to recognise mental illness the lives of individuals can be improved and they can begin to hope again.  Investment in mhGAP training is thus a relatively low cost way of bringing care and relief to as many people as possible.

If you would like to make a difference to the lives of people with mental illness in Uganda by supporting the work of Jamie’s Fund please click here.

Hugh Burgess

[1] Uganda Martyrs Hospital, Lubaga is a private, not-for-profit hospital that was started in 1899  by Catholic missionaries. It  currently has 237 in-patient beds as well as a range of out-patient clinics. The hospital seeks to provide “quality, accessible and affordable healthcare services” across a wide range of specialties.