Investing in mental health in Somalia: harnessing community mental health services through task shifting.

Journal: Global mental health (Cambridge, England)

Volume: 9

Issue: 

Year of Publication: 

Affiliated Institutions:  The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. WHO Somalia, Mogadishu, Somalia. Mental Health Department Somalia Federal Ministry of Health, Mogadishu, Somalia.

Abstract summary 

The increase of mental health issues globally has been well documented and now reflected in the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals as a matter of global health significance. At the same time, studies show the mental health situations in conflict and post-conflict settings much higher than the rest of the world, lack the financial, health services and human resource capacity to address the challenges.The study used a descriptive literature review and collected data from public domain, mostly mental health data from WHO's Global Health Observatory. Since there is no primary database for Somalia's public health research, the bibliographic databases used for mental health in this study included Medline, PubMed, CINAHL, PsycINFO, and Google Scholar.The review of the mental health literature shows one of the biggest casualties of the civil war was loss of essential human resources in healthcare as most either fled the country or were part of the victims of the war.In an attempt to address the human resource gap, there are calls to task-shift so that available human resource can be utilized efficiently and effectively. This policy paper discusses the case of Somalia, the impact of decade-long civil conflict on mental health and health services, the significant gap in mental health service delivery and how to strategically and evidently task-shift in closing the mental health gap in service delivery.

Authors & Co-authors:  Ibrahim Mohamed M Malik Mamunur Rahman MR Noor Zeynab Z

Study Outcome 

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Statistics
Citations :  Abdillahi FA, Ismail EA and Singh SP (2020) Mental health in Somaliland: a critical situation. BJPsych International 17, 11–14.
Authors :  3
Identifiers
Doi : 10.1017/gmh.2022.4
SSN : 2054-4251
Study Population
Male,Female
Mesh Terms
Other Terms
Somalia;UHC;mental health care;mhGAP;task-shifting/sharing
Study Design
Study Approach
Country of Study
Mali
Publication Country
England