Workshop on mhGAP Community Toolkit at Banke

A one-day workshop was held at Banke district on 21 February 2022 to collect feedback on the mhGAP (Mental Health Gap Action Programme) Community Toolkit developed by World Health Organization (WHO). The workshop was conducted by TPO Alliance in coordination with TPO Nepal. A total of 21 participants including teachers, female community health volunteers (FCHVs), health workers, and social workers participated in the workshop.

The workshop was facilitated by Mr. Jeetendra Rai from TPO Nepal. After the introduction of the participants, Dr. Kamal Gautam, Executive Manager of TPO Nepal, gave a presentation that included topics such as the introduction of the organization, mhGAP, community toolkit, and the toolkit modules. After the presentation, participants were divided into four groups (I. social workers, II. Teachers, III. Health workers, and IV. FCHVs) for the discussion on the community toolkit modules and feedback collection based on their prior study of the toolkit. The group work lasted one hour which was followed by presentations from each group.

The first group (social workers) gave their feedback presentation on Module 1 of the toolkit. This group found the module to be informative, awareness-raising, and important. They also found that the content answered the needs of their community and colleagues. At the end of their presentation, they suggested that it would be better if the content were in multiple languages.

Similarly, the second group (teachers) gave their feedback presentation on Module 2 of the toolkit. The second group found the module easy to use as it covered all content and methods. “The booklet requires some improvement in language. Otherwise, it contains all the important topics such as healthy lifestyle, exercise, nutritious food, and stress management”, said the presenter of Group two.

The third group (health workers) gave their feedback presentation on Module 3 and 4. They requested the toolkit to be made shorter and to include the identification of people living with mental health problems in a pictorial format. Finally, the last group (FCHVs) gave their presentation on Module 5. This group highlighted the importance of simplifying the words used in the toolkit, such as dementia, comorbidity, and intervention. They also requested to add gender-based violence (GBV) as a cause of increasing mental health problems in the community.

Overall, the workshop helped collect important feedback on the community toolkit, which will be useful to adapt it in the context of Nepal.