WHO Tweeted About EQUIP A New Platform To Increase Quality Care Of Psychological Support

People nowadays are suffering from a lot of psychological problems like anxiety disorders, depression, and personality disorders, to name a few. These mental disorders affect one’s lifestyle at large and proper care can help them live a long and healthy life.
Most people with mental health conditions globally do not receive effective care.
Among people living with depression, just 3% living in low and middle-income countries receive even minimally adequate treatment in part due to a lack of well-trained workers.
In humanitarian crises, such as those ongoing in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Yemen, and more recently Ukraine and neighbouring countries, the scale of the need, coupled with the severe shortage of mental health specialists, means that other means of providing mental health and psychosocial support are required.

WHO Tweeted About EQUIP, Ensuring High Quality and Effective Psychological Support

Psychological interventions can be effectively delivered by non-specialised such as community workers when they receive training and supervision. However, training and supervision may vary in quality which can lead to less effective care.
To ensure quality in training and supervision, WHO with a partnership with UNICEF developed the ensuring quality in psychological support platform to guide trainers and supervisors on how to change their existing programs into competency-based approaches
According to the leader of EQUIP at WHO, the EQUIP project since 2019 has collaborated with multiple organizations around the world to develop a competency-based approach that can be applied to the training of psychological interventions. Through the EQUIP project, tools are developed that are needed by trainers and supervisors to ensure trainees are highly skilled and competent in helping people with depression and anxiety.

Launch of Digital Training For Greater Accessibility

Before the pandemic, EQUIP was largely delivered by in-person training. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the training increasingly moved online. But the trainers were still able to help people online because the pandemic period was such a challenging time.
WHO and UNICEF are formally launching the digital version of EQUIP, making the platform freely available to support trainers and supervisors. This will considerably increase the accessibility and quality of psychological interventions. In so doing, training programmes around the world will be better positioned to deliver skilled helpers to improve mental health and reduce suffering.

Over To You:

Psychological disorders can not only affect mental well-being but also physical health, so quality care and support are necessary for all and should be made accessible by the government.