Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa

Given task-sharing mental health counselling to non-specialist providers is a recognised strategy to increase service capacity, ensuring that their training, supervision, and support needs are met is necessary to facilitate the sustainable delivery of a high-quality service. Using in-depth interview...

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Main Authors: Jacobs, Y., Myers-Franchi, Bronwyn, van der Westhuizen, C., Brooke-Sumner, C., Sorsdahl, K.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: SPRINGER 2021
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/85624
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author Jacobs, Y.
Myers-Franchi, Bronwyn
van der Westhuizen, C.
Brooke-Sumner, C.
Sorsdahl, K.
author_facet Jacobs, Y.
Myers-Franchi, Bronwyn
van der Westhuizen, C.
Brooke-Sumner, C.
Sorsdahl, K.
author_sort Jacobs, Y.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Given task-sharing mental health counselling to non-specialist providers is a recognised strategy to increase service capacity, ensuring that their training, supervision, and support needs are met is necessary to facilitate the sustainable delivery of a high-quality service. Using in-depth interviews, we qualitatively explored the experiences of 18 facility-based counsellors (FBCs) tasked with delivering a counselling intervention within chronic disease services offered within primary care facilities participating in the project MIND cluster randomised controlled trial. Findings show that project MIND training with a strong emphasis on role playing and skills rehearsal improved FBCs’ confidence and competence, complemented by highly structured supervision and debriefing provided by a registered counsellor, were key strategies for supporting the implementation of task-shared mental health counselling. FBCs perceived many benefits to providing mental health counselling in primary healthcare but systemic interventions are needed for sustained implementation.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-856242021-10-21T00:20:38Z Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa Jacobs, Y. Myers-Franchi, Bronwyn van der Westhuizen, C. Brooke-Sumner, C. Sorsdahl, K. Science & Technology Life Sciences & Biomedicine Health Policy & Services Public, Environmental & Occupational Health Psychiatry Health Care Sciences & Services Task-sharing Common mental disorders Training and supervision South Africa MIDDLE-INCOME COUNTRIES LOW-RESOURCE SETTINGS PSYCHOLOGICAL TREATMENTS PSYCHIATRIC-DISORDERS THERAPY QUALITY PRIMARY-CARE SUPERVISION STRESS PREVALENCE WORKERS Given task-sharing mental health counselling to non-specialist providers is a recognised strategy to increase service capacity, ensuring that their training, supervision, and support needs are met is necessary to facilitate the sustainable delivery of a high-quality service. Using in-depth interviews, we qualitatively explored the experiences of 18 facility-based counsellors (FBCs) tasked with delivering a counselling intervention within chronic disease services offered within primary care facilities participating in the project MIND cluster randomised controlled trial. Findings show that project MIND training with a strong emphasis on role playing and skills rehearsal improved FBCs’ confidence and competence, complemented by highly structured supervision and debriefing provided by a registered counsellor, were key strategies for supporting the implementation of task-shared mental health counselling. FBCs perceived many benefits to providing mental health counselling in primary healthcare but systemic interventions are needed for sustained implementation. 2021 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/85624 10.1007/s10597-020-00734-0 English http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ SPRINGER fulltext
spellingShingle Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Health Policy & Services
Public, Environmental & Occupational Health
Psychiatry
Health Care Sciences & Services
Task-sharing
Common mental disorders
Training and supervision
South Africa
MIDDLE-INCOME COUNTRIES
LOW-RESOURCE SETTINGS
PSYCHOLOGICAL TREATMENTS
PSYCHIATRIC-DISORDERS
THERAPY QUALITY
PRIMARY-CARE
SUPERVISION
STRESS
PREVALENCE
WORKERS
Jacobs, Y.
Myers-Franchi, Bronwyn
van der Westhuizen, C.
Brooke-Sumner, C.
Sorsdahl, K.
Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title_full Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title_fullStr Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title_full_unstemmed Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title_short Task Sharing or Task Dumping: Counsellors Experiences of Delivering a Psychosocial Intervention for Mental Health Problems in South Africa
title_sort task sharing or task dumping: counsellors experiences of delivering a psychosocial intervention for mental health problems in south africa
topic Science & Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
Health Policy & Services
Public, Environmental & Occupational Health
Psychiatry
Health Care Sciences & Services
Task-sharing
Common mental disorders
Training and supervision
South Africa
MIDDLE-INCOME COUNTRIES
LOW-RESOURCE SETTINGS
PSYCHOLOGICAL TREATMENTS
PSYCHIATRIC-DISORDERS
THERAPY QUALITY
PRIMARY-CARE
SUPERVISION
STRESS
PREVALENCE
WORKERS
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/85624