Feasibility of a guided self‐help intervention to reduce psychological distress in South Sudanese refugee women in Uganda

Tol, Wietse A.; Augustinavicius, Jura; Carswell, Kenneth; Leku, Marx R.; Adaku, Alex; Brown, Felicity L.; García‐Moreno, Claudia; Ventevogel, Peter; White, Ross; Kogan, Cary S.; Bryant, Richard A.; Ommeren, Mark van

doi:10.1002/wps.20537

Cited by 32 publications

(41 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…ACT, with its psychological flexibility model, stresses the role of spirituality and mindfulness, and creates space for bringing positive experiential activities that carry a positive psychology perspective. ACT-based RCTs has shown that ACT to be effective to enhance work quality (Aasdahl et al, 2018;Finnes, Enebrink, Sampaio, Sorjonen, Dahl, Ghaderi, Nager, & Feldman, 2019), resilience (Bahreini & Sanagouye-Moharer, 2019), coaching (Levin, Haeger, & Cruz, 2019), marital relationship (Amidisimakani, Najarpourian, & Samavi, 2018), academic success (Paliliunas, Belisle, & Dixon, 2018), self-esteem (Rasooli & Kalantari, 2018), oral health (Wide, Hagman, Werner, & Hakeberg, 2018), mindfulness in sports (Dehghani, Saf, Vosoughi, Tebbenouri, & Zarnagh, 2018), parent training for parents who have a child with autism (Corti, Pergolizzi, Vanzin, Cargasacchi, Villa, Pozzi, & Molteni, 2018), positive parenting strategies (Moyer, Page, McMakin, Murrell, Lester, & Walker, 2018), mental health for college students (Grégoire, Lachance, Bouffard, & Dionne, 2018), and life-quality for people with HIV/AIDS (Faezipour, Ghanbaripanah, Seyedalinaghi, Hajiabdolbaghi, & Voltarelli, 2018), the elderly (Wicaksana, Wahju, Eko, & Yudara, 2018), and refugees (Tol et al, 2018). Similarly, ACT-based bibliotherapy RCTs have been reported to enhance mental health for staff and teachers (Jeffcoat & Hayes, 2012) and Japanese college students (Muto, Hayes, & Jeffcoat, 2011).…”

Section: Tanhan 200mentioning

confidence: 99%

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with Ecological Systems Theory: Addressing Muslim Mental Health Issues and Wellbeing

Tanhan

2019

2717-7564

151

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Muslims across the word underutilize mental health services for addressing their wellbeing and biopsychosocial, spiritual, and contextual issues. By 2030, the global Muslim population is expected to reach 2.2 billion people. This indicates that Muslim mental health is gaining importance and would require contextually (i.e., spiritually, culturally, empirically) more effective services. Practitioners used Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Ecological Systems Theory (EST) to promote wellbeing and address psychopathology for diverse groups. However, rigorous and comprehensive literature from 1986 to 2019 did not produce research addressing how ACT could be consumed to serve Muslims. Researchers in Muslim mental health have suggested benefitting from EST yet only few have mentioned using ACT. ACT is one of the most effective therapies based on randomized control trials to enhance wellbeing and address psychopathology. The main purposes of this paper are to (a) explain how ACT is one of the most appropriate counseling approaches to be utilized with Muslims because ACT and Islam have many commonalities and (b) propose ACT with EST perspective to enable a much more contextual perspective of ACT so that mental health professionals could promote wellbeing and address psychopathology at all ecological levels for all, starting with Muslims. With the arrival of third and fourth wave of counseling approaches, the use of positive psychology in research and practice has increased dramatically. ACT, Islam, and EST also highly stress a positive approach perspective thus considering of ACT and EST together might promise more effective research and practice in positive and abnormal psychology.

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Section: Tanhan 200mentioning

confidence: 99%

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with Ecological Systems Theory: Addressing Muslim Mental Health Issues and Wellbeing

Tanhan

2019

2717-7564

151

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“…Based on the population statistics (V.Kahi, Health Information System Officer, Public Health Section, UNHCR, Geneva) and experiences in preliminary studies (Tol et al . 2018 a , b ), we estimate that recruiting sufficient participants from each of 14 clusters will be feasible. To ensure participant retention in the study, we aim to keep detailed address information and discuss current location with family members if participants have moved.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 2018 a ); and (2) a feasibility cluster-randomised controlled trial (cRCT) with one group of women in the intervention condition, and one group of women in the control condition (Tol et al . 2018 b ). Given the concerns of contamination in small communities and with the provision of an illustrated book, a cluster design was chosen.…”

Section: Current Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

Self Help Plus: study protocol for a cluster-randomised controlled trial of guided self-help with South Sudanese refugee women in Uganda

et al. 2018

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Background.Exposure to armed conflict and forced displacement constitute significant risks for mental health. Existing evidence-based psychological interventions have limitations for scaling-up in low-resource humanitarian settings. The WHO has developed a guided self-help intervention, Self Help Plus (SH+), which is brief, implemented by non-specialists, and designed to be delivered to people with and without specific mental disorders. This paper outlines the study protocol for an evaluation of the SH+ intervention in northern Uganda, with South Sudanese refugee women.Methods.A two-arm, single-blind cluster-randomised controlled trial will be conducted in 14 villages in Rhino Camp refugee settlement, with at least 588 women experiencing psychological distress. Villages will be randomly assigned to receive either SH+ with enhanced usual care (EUC), or EUC alone. SH+ is a five-session guided self-help intervention delivered in workshops with audio-recorded materials and accompanying pictorial guide. The primary outcome is reduction in overall psychological distress over time, with 3 months post-treatment as the primary end-point. Secondary outcomes are self-defined psychosocial concerns, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms, hazardous alcohol use, feelings of anger, interethnic relations, psychological flexibility, functional impairment and subjective wellbeing. Psychological flexibility is a hypothesised mediator, and past trauma history and intervention attendance will be explored as potential moderators.Discussion.This trial will provide important information on the effectiveness of a scalable, guided self-help intervention for improving psychological health and wellbeing among people affected by adversity.Trial Registration:ISRCTN50148022; registered 13/03/2017.

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“…The 5-session intervention is delivered through audio-recorded materials and a self-help book in workshops of 20–30 people by briefly trained lay facilitators [ 48 ]. The intervention was adapted and piloted with both men and women, which found further adaptation was required for male refugees [ 18 , 19 ]. A subsequent cluster randomized trial with female refugees in 14 villages ( n = 694) found benefits at the 3-month follow-up with regard to psychological distress, depressive and posttraumatic stress symptoms, feelings of anger, functional impairment, and subjective wellbeing [ 20 ].…”

Section: Initial Findingsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving mental health and psychosocial wellbeing in humanitarian settings: reflections on research funded through R2HC

et al. 2020

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Major knowledge gaps remain concerning the most effective ways to address mental health and psychosocial needs of populations affected by humanitarian crises. The Research for Health in Humanitarian Crisis (R2HC) program aims to strengthen humanitarian health practice and policy through research. As a significant portion of R2HC’s research has focused on mental health and psychosocial support interventions, the program has been interested in strengthening a community of practice in this field. Following a meeting between grantees, we set out to provide an overview of the R2HC portfolio, and draw lessons learned. In this paper, we discuss the mental health and psychosocial support-focused research projects funded by R2HC; review the implications of initial findings from this research portfolio; and highlight four remaining knowledge gaps in this field. Between 2014 and 2019, R2HC funded 18 academic-practitioner partnerships focused on mental health and psychosocial support, comprising 38% of the overall portfolio (18 of 48 projects) at a value of approximately 7.2 million GBP. All projects have focused on evaluating the impact of interventions. In line with consensus-based recommendations to consider a wide range of mental health and psychosocial needs in humanitarian settings, research projects have evaluated diverse interventions. Findings so far have both challenged and confirmed widely-held assumptions about the effectiveness of mental health and psychosocial interventions in humanitarian settings. They point to the importance of building effective, sustained, and diverse partnerships between scholars, humanitarian practitioners, and funders, to ensure long-term program improvements and appropriate evidence-informed decision making. Further research needs to fill knowledge gaps regarding how to: scale-up interventions that have been found to be effective (e.g., questions related to integration across sectors, adaptation of interventions across different contexts, and optimal care systems); address neglected mental health conditions and populations (e.g., elderly, people with disabilities, sexual minorities, people with severe, pre-existing mental disorders); build on available local resources and supports (e.g., how to build on traditional, religious healing and community-wide social support practices); and ensure equity, quality, fidelity, and sustainability for interventions in real-world contexts (e.g., answering questions about how interventions from controlled studies can be transferred to more representative humanitarian contexts).

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Feasibility of a guided self‐help intervention to reduce psychological distress in South Sudanese refugee women in Uganda

Cited by 32 publications

References 7 publications

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with Ecological Systems Theory: Addressing Muslim Mental Health Issues and Wellbeing

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy with Ecological Systems Theory: Addressing Muslim Mental Health Issues and Wellbeing

Self Help Plus: study protocol for a cluster-randomised controlled trial of guided self-help with South Sudanese refugee women in Uganda

Improving mental health and psychosocial wellbeing in humanitarian settings: reflections on research funded through R2HC

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