Importance Of Mental Health In Uganda

Over the past several decades, awareness of mental illness has grown significantly. More than ever before, we are understanding the importance of diagnosis and treatment. Recent research shows that the overall burden of mental illness accounts for 32-34% of years lived with disability (YLD) and 13% of disability-adjusted life years (DALY) (Vigo et al., 2016). This a significant increase from the previous estimates of 21% and 7% respectively (Vigo et al., 2016). With these current estimates, mental illness places first in global burden of disease in terms of YLD and DALY’s. The status of mental health and the treatment of mental illness is evolving in Uganda. Mental Health is now recognized as a serious public health and development issue.

Outdated mental health policies and misaligned legislation have made it difficult for the health department and government to collaborate and coordinate their efforts. In addition, the process to reach mental health services remains ill-defined and communication between mental health service providers and primary health care practitioners is minimal. There needs to be finalization of the current mental health policies and further development of a comprehensive Mental Health Strategic Plan. ƒThis plan needs to address problems at both the local and national

Up to 90% of Ugandans believe that mental illness is caused by curses or demons (BBC, 2015). As a result, patients who need help are often subjected to traditional medicine and rituals or locked up until their demons are expelled (BBC, 2015). Without public acceptance and support, mentally individuals may not even Fortunately, public education media campaigns and local community engagement combined have been shown to be highly effective methods of increasing mental health literacy (WHO, 2004). However, even if mental illnesses become societally acceptable, mental health professional training remains insufficient. Currently there are only 30 psychiatrists in Uganda serving a population of 35 million people and a single national psychiatric hospital in the whole country (WHO, 2006). With so few resources, mental health care needs to be a part of primary care as well. However, only 10% of the training for medical doctors was devoted to mental health (WHO, 2006). For this reason, there needs to be more comprehensive mental health training for not only primary care physicians, but also nurses, social workers, and other healthcare workers. This training would include both teaching medical knowledge and teaching about human rights policies. All of these initiatives require significant funding. Uganda needs to allocate more than just 4% of its funds to mental health if they want to address these issues properly.