ZIMBABWE— The Ministry of Health and Child Care (MoHCC) in partnership with the World Health Organization (WHO) & the Friendship Bench, has launched a new revolutionary mental health project, FRIENDZ Project.
The project through the facilitation and implementation by WHO Mental Health Gap Action Programme (mhGAP) and Friendship Bench Problem Solving Therapy (PST), the project aims to reach 1 million people by 2025.
The FRIENDZ project will enhance access to quality mental health services through improved referral pathways.
The project will then guide individuals through their journey from the community level to PHC, secondary and tertiary levels, and back, creating a seamless mental health network.
The project aims to scale up the assessment and management of priority mental, neurological, and substance abuse disorders, extending from the community to primary and tertiary healthcare levels in Zimbabwe.
The ambitious mental health project will be implemented in four provinces, namely, Mashonaland East, Mashonaland Central, Harare, and Matabeleland North, over a three-year period.
The FRIENDZ project is also part of the Zimbabwe Special Initiative for Mental Health and aims to provide effective, simple, cost-effective options to provide evidence-based mental health care in under-resourced settings.
Dr. Patience Maunganidze, MoHCC Deputy Director of the Mental Health Department, officiated the official launch of FRIENDZ.
She conveyed the government’s enthusiasm about this revolutionary project that promises to increase the quality and accessibility of MH services, especially in rural areas.
“Through this program, we will train health workers at the PHC level to provide quality mental health services, ensuring no one is left behind,” Dr. Maunganidze added.
WHO Zimbabwe Country Representative, Professor Jean-Marie Dangou, speaking during the launch, expressed his excitement about the integration of the WHO mhGAP and Friendship Bench PST within the FRIENDZ project framework.
“Universal Health Coverage cannot be achieved without MH. Therefore, we are steadfast in our commitment to assist Zimbabwe in fortifying its MH services,” Prof. Dangou emphasized.
A coming of minds
The FRIENDZ project, which will run for three years, is financially supported by Grand Challenges Canada, which has committed US$820,000.
These funds are allocated under the WHO Special Initiative for Mental Health, supported by NORAD and USAID, with a total budget of US$2.1 million.
Futuristically, the WHO mhGAP ambitiously aims to scale up services for mental, neurological, and substance use disorders.
This program is particularly targeted toward low- and middle-income countries and it propounds that with the right care, psychosocial assistance, and medication, tens of millions of individuals could be treated for conditions such as depression, schizophrenia, and epilepsy.
The PST, a feature of the Friendship Bench approach, is an evidence-based, cognitive-behavioral intervention.
The Friendship Bench program has been designed to aid individuals in coping with stressful life experiences with an aim to enhance resilience and improve functioning in various areas of their lives, including personal, professional, social, or self-directed development.
The amalgamation of these two impactful approaches is poised to significantly increase access to mental health services in Zimbabwe.
The evidence gathered from the four provinces will be instrumental in the nationwide rollout, using the lessons learned from these provinces for resource mapping and generating the required resources.
Who is the Friendship Bench?
The Friendship Bench program, a Zimbabwean community-based mental health intervention where trained community health workers sit on wooden park “Friendship Benches” set up at primary health care clinics or safe community spaces.
The program provides structured problem-solving talk therapy to community members who come looking for mental health support or are referred by nurses or other community members.
The program was founded by Dixon Chibanda in 2006 and was developed over a 20-year period of community-based research to bridge the mental health treatment gap.
“Today marks a significant day for mental health services in Zimbabwe. The FRIENDZ project will allow us to increase access to community-based MH services, reaching deep into marginalized communities to serve those who often do not get access to such services,” said Friendship Bench Director Professor, Dixon Chibanda.
Since 2006, Dr. Chibanda and his team have trained over 600 community health workers in evidence-based talk therapy, which they deliver for free in more than 70 communities in Zimbabwe, and in 2017 alone 30,000 were seen on a Friendship Bench.
The FB has now expanded beyond Zimbabwe; it is being used in Malawi and Zanzibar, and it has been adapted for New York City, highlighting those interventions created in low- and middle-income countries can be adapted for high-income countries.
There are several FB studies currently underway including The Youth Friendship Bench (YouFB), OptFB, FB Plus, and Zvandiri.
Mental Health in Zimbabwe- Tackling a multifaceted problem with New Methods
Like most Sub-Saharan African countries, Zimbabwe faces significant challenges in meeting the Mental Health (MH) care needs of its population.
With only two psychiatric hospitals and one psychiatrist for every one million people, the vast majority of Zimbabwe’s 14 million population, including the 67.8% living in rural areas, have limited access to mental health care.
In addition, mental health resources are concentrated in major cities and hospitals, making the integration of mental health care at the Primary Health Care (PHC) level of paramount importance.
To address the urgent need for expanded mental services at the PHC level, the MoHCC in Zimbabwe through its Zimbabwe Special Initiative for Mental Health is investing in new and better ways to provide required mental health care to its people.
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