Abstract:Background Depression is one of the most common mental illnesses affecting around 322 million individual in the world. Although the prevalence of depression is high and its treatment is effective, little is known about its pooled prevalence and help seeking behaviors in the community settings of Ethiopia. Thus, this study aimed to determine the pooled prevalence of depression and its help seeking behaviors in Ethiopia. Methods A systematic literature search in the databases of Pub-Med, Cochrane, and Google Sch… Show more
“…Our finding is higher than what has been reported in the general population of Ethiopia. In a meta-analysis of Ethiopian studies the pooled prevalence of the help-seeking intention of people with depression in Ethiopia is 42% [35] which is much lower than the current finding. The possible explanations for the difference could be difference in mental health literacy, study population and data collection instruments being used.…”
Section: Discussioncontrasting
confidence: 79%
“…However, only few people receive professional mental health service. For instance, a meta-analysis reported that the pooled prevalence of formal mental health help-seeking behaviors and intention of people with depression is 38% and 48%, respectively [35]. In Ethiopia, most people with mental illness first contact non-professional care providers such as religious leaders and herbalists [36].…”
Context: There is limited evidence on the extent of the perceived need for professional mental health care and barriers to the delivery of mental distress services among university students in low and middle-income countries. Objective: The current study was designed to assess the prevalence of mental distress, perceived need for professional mental health care and barriers to the delivery of the service for regular undergraduate university students. Methods: A multi-stage sampling technique was used to recruit 1135 regular undergraduate university students. Symptoms of mental distress were evaluated using the Self-Reported Questionnaire (SRQ-20) and a score of eight and above was used to identify positive cases. The perceived need for professional mental health care was assessed using one question with binary responses, whereas barriers to mental health care were assessed using Barriers to Access to Care Evaluation (BACE-30) tool. The association of demographic variables with total mean scores of BACE-III sub-scales was modeled using multiple linear regression. Results: The prevalence of mental distress symptoms was 34.6% and the perceived need for professional mental health care was 70.5%. The top five barriers to receiving professional mental health service were (a) thinking the problem would get better by itself, (b) being unsure where to go to get professional care, (c) wanting to solve the problem by own, (d) denying mental health problem, and (e) preferring to get alternative forms of mental care. Conclusions: The high prevalence of mental distress, mental health care gap, and the report of barriers to professional mental health care among Ethiopian regular undergraduate students is a call for action. Keywords: Mental distress, Perceived need, Barrier, and Professional mental health care.
“…Our finding is higher than what has been reported in the general population of Ethiopia. In a meta-analysis of Ethiopian studies the pooled prevalence of the help-seeking intention of people with depression in Ethiopia is 42% [35] which is much lower than the current finding. The possible explanations for the difference could be difference in mental health literacy, study population and data collection instruments being used.…”
Section: Discussioncontrasting
confidence: 79%
“…However, only few people receive professional mental health service. For instance, a meta-analysis reported that the pooled prevalence of formal mental health help-seeking behaviors and intention of people with depression is 38% and 48%, respectively [35]. In Ethiopia, most people with mental illness first contact non-professional care providers such as religious leaders and herbalists [36].…”
Context: There is limited evidence on the extent of the perceived need for professional mental health care and barriers to the delivery of mental distress services among university students in low and middle-income countries. Objective: The current study was designed to assess the prevalence of mental distress, perceived need for professional mental health care and barriers to the delivery of the service for regular undergraduate university students. Methods: A multi-stage sampling technique was used to recruit 1135 regular undergraduate university students. Symptoms of mental distress were evaluated using the Self-Reported Questionnaire (SRQ-20) and a score of eight and above was used to identify positive cases. The perceived need for professional mental health care was assessed using one question with binary responses, whereas barriers to mental health care were assessed using Barriers to Access to Care Evaluation (BACE-30) tool. The association of demographic variables with total mean scores of BACE-III sub-scales was modeled using multiple linear regression. Results: The prevalence of mental distress symptoms was 34.6% and the perceived need for professional mental health care was 70.5%. The top five barriers to receiving professional mental health service were (a) thinking the problem would get better by itself, (b) being unsure where to go to get professional care, (c) wanting to solve the problem by own, (d) denying mental health problem, and (e) preferring to get alternative forms of mental care. Conclusions: The high prevalence of mental distress, mental health care gap, and the report of barriers to professional mental health care among Ethiopian regular undergraduate students is a call for action. Keywords: Mental distress, Perceived need, Barrier, and Professional mental health care.
“…Previous literatures showed more than one in ve of the community residents (20.5%) had depression in Ethiopia (21). We examined communities' preference to seek help for depression by presenting them a vignette depicting an individual experiencing a major depressive disorder and asking them to report their preferences to seek help from formal and/ informal sources if they were having a similar situation.…”
Section: Discussionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Indeed, it increases the burden of other chronic medical illnesses such as HIV/AIDS, cardiac failure, diabetes mellitus,tuberculosis and surgical illness (9,10). Its' impact on the cause of life threating illnesses is unbearable in low income countries including Ethiopia (11,12) with the estimated magnitude ranging from 2.4% to 60% (13)(14)(15)(16)(17).The other trajectory consequence of depression is suicide (8,18,19) and substance use (20,21).…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…This study helps to guide the effective planning and provision of mental health services and health policy of the country to explore the communities' preferences of help-seeking treatment areas. In Ethiopia, there are studies regarding formal help seeking behavior about depression from health care providers (14,16,21,45), but, there is no a community survey on formal and informal help seeking preferences. Thus, the purpose of this community survey was to assess the magnitude of formal and informal help seeking preferences for depression in northwest Ethiopia.…”
Background: Depression is the leading cause of disability at a population level and globally 350 million people are suffering from depression. Many people suffer from depression use different sources of help for their mental health problems. People with different mental health problems seek help from formal and/or informal sources. This gives crucial information on community,s beliefs and perception regarding their preference for help if they faced depression. This study helps to guide effective planning and provision of mental health services and health policy of the country to explore the community,s preferences of help-seeking. Objective: The aim of this community based cross-sectional study was to contrast patterns of formal and informal help-seeking preferences for depression among residents of Aykel town, Northwest Ethiopia. Methods: This cross-sectional population based study included 832 participants. We used a major depressive disorder case vignette and general help-seeking questionnaire (GHSQ) to assess the preferences to seek help. Study participants were selected by multistage cluster sampling technique. Data were collected by face-to-face interviews. An independent- sample t- test and analysis of variance test (ANOVA) was performed to determine mean score difference in socio-demographic characteristics of the participants for informal sources of help.Results: A total of 656 subjects (78.8%) showed high propensity to intimate partner, and 655 (78.7%) of the study subjects had high propensity to mental health professional. The mean score of the residents’ preference to seek help from informal sources was 3.41±0.60.The mean score of preference to seek help from formal sources was 3.18±0.75. A total of 276 (33.2%) subjects showed high propensity to both informal and formal sources of help. The result also showed that there was mean score difference in preferences to informal help between subjects with strong social support and low and/ moderate social support (P<0.001).Conclusion: The result suggests that the majority of the residents had a higher preference to seek help from informal sources compared to formal sources of care. Mean score difference was observed in degree of social support and occupational status(student,housewife and jobless) for informal sources of help. Providing and strengthening both formal and informal sources of help in conjunction is crucial to get a more qualified and effective care of depressed patients.
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