The Culture of Mental Illness and Psychiatric Practice in Africa

Balogun-Mwangi, Oyenike

doi:10.1080/09638237.2017.1417576

Cited by 2 publications

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“…Secondly, various studies show that common mood disorders such as MDD are expressed differently within different contexts ( 7 , 15 , 17 ). This is unsurprising because culture informs the experience of mental health disorders, and Western-derived taxonomies often miss culturally-salient features of distress ( 14 , 16 , 28 ). Accordingly, it can be quite beneficial to utilize the network approach to identify the dominant networks and most influential nodes which are specific to local cultural contexts.…”

Section: The Move To Decolonize Mental Health Care In Africamentioning

confidence: 99%

The network approach: A path to decolonize mental health care

Alemu

Osborn²,

Wasanga³

2023

Front. Public Health

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The violent colonial history of psychiatry in Africa prevents individuals from help-seeking. Because of this history, mental health care is now stigmatized, and clinical research, practice, and policy fail to capture the salient features of distress across African communities. If we are to transform mental health care for all, we must adopt decolonizing frameworks to ensure mental health research, practice, and policy are enacted in a manner that is ethical, democratic, critical, and serves the needs of local communities. Here, we present that the network approach to psychopathology as an invaluable tool in achieving this purpose. The network approach recognizes mental health disorders not as discrete entities, but rather as dynamic networks that are made of psychiatric symptoms (called nodes) and the relationships between these symptoms (called edges). This approach can pave a path to decolonizing mental health care by alleviating stigma, allowing context-based understanding of mental health and mental health problems, opening new avenues for (low-cost) mental health care and empowering local researchers to pioneer context-based knowledge production and treatment.

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Section: The Move To Decolonize Mental Health Care In Africamentioning

confidence: 99%

The network approach: A path to decolonize mental health care

Alemu

Osborn²,

Wasanga³

2023

Front. Public Health

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Surely, until quite recently in historical terms, the treatment of mental disorder was a matter of spiritual concern rather than a matter for physicians? This is still the case in some cultures, and it has been argued that there is a ‘need for an integrated approach that includes traditional healing practices’ (Balogun-Mwangi, 2018).…”

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confidence: 99%

Book Review: Our psychiatric future: The politics of mental health, Approach to the psychiatric patient: Case-based essays (2nd ed.) and Person centered approach to recovery in medicine: Insights from psychosomatic medicine and consultation-liaison psychiatry

Guha

2019

Int J Soc Psychiatry

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The Culture of Mental Illness and Psychiatric Practice in Africa

Cited by 2 publications

References 0 publications

The network approach: A path to decolonize mental health care

The network approach: A path to decolonize mental health care

Book Review: Our psychiatric future: The politics of mental health, Approach to the psychiatric patient: Case-based essays (2nd ed.) and Person centered approach to recovery in medicine: Insights from psychosomatic medicine and consultation-liaison psychiatry

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