Doha: The National Primary Health Care Strategy 2013-2018 aims to address mental health problems that affect Qatari residents.
The strategy, designed by Primary Health Care Corporation (PHCC), aims to develop mental health protocols and guidelines, training staff and forming primary care mental health teams, a release said yesterday.
Some primary healthcare providers have psychologists and counselling services, but the only mental health professionals within PHCC work on adolescent mental health issues as part of the school health team.
Primary care mental health teams will comprise a physician, a psychologist, a counsellor, a social worker and psychiatric nurses that will work together in a five-step programme. This means that people start off at Step 1, which corresponds to a regular primary healthcare appointment.
All primary healthcare clinicians will receive basic mental health training so that they can identify signs and symptoms needing intervention. If necessary, family physicians would then be able to refer on to Step 2, the mentioned Primary Care Mental Health Teams, established at hub PHCC centres, who will receive advanced training.
The programme would conclude with severe and complex mental health conditions being directed to Secondary Care Mental Services.
Based on international comparators, it is estimated that 25 percent of the population have mental health problems. Many of those with mental illness are not being detected, yet most could be treated simply in primary healthcare.
A study in PHCC centres in Qatar found that, in a sample size of 1,660, 13.5 percent of those surveyed had depression disorders and 10.3 percent had anxiety disorders. Meanwhile, attitudes towards mental health display a lack of understanding.
Another study of public perception in PHCC centres found that only 33 percent of the 2,514 respondents thought that people with mental health problems could do ordinary jobs and almost 40 percent equated mental illness to be being possessed by evil spirits.
This strategy, together with the forthcoming Qatar mental health strategy, aims at tackling these perceptions and giving mental health care the prominence it deserves. Currently the majority of mental health services in Qatar are provided through secondary care.
A study of PHCC physicians found that 69 percent had no training in mental health. Only 38 percent were using mental health guidelines and there was a wide range in the guidelines being used.
In this context, 97 percent of those with mental health problems are referred on to secondary care and only 10 percent of those referred on are then followed-up in primary healthcare post treatment.
The remaining 90 percent either do not attend following referral, or attend but no feedback is given to the PHCC physicians. The Peninsula
