Problem Management Plus (PM+): a WHO transdiagnostic psychological intervention for common mental health problems

Strengthening mental health care systems for Syrian refugees in Europe and the Middle East: integrating scalable psychological interventions in eight countries

“…One of these, called Problem Management Plus (PM+), was designed for use in communities affected by adversity (Dawson et al, 2015). PM+ is available as an individual version (Individual PM+) evaluated in Pakistan (Rahman et al, 2016) and Kenya (Bryant et al, 2017) and as a group version (Group PM+) under evaluation in Swat, Pakistan (Chiumento et al, 2017; Khan et al, 2017).…”

“…They may be delivered by non-professional helpers in community or primary care settings or by lay people such as peer-refugees after approximately 10 days of training followed by weekly group supervision by a trained clinician. Clients are taught four strategies: stress management (slow breathing exercises); problem solving (proactive management of practical difficulties through a series of sequential steps including selection of problems, brainstorming for solutions, planning implementation of solutions); behavioural activation (re-engaging with pleasant and task-oriented activities); and skills to strengthen one’s social support (see Dawson et al, 2015, for a more detailed description).…”

Trauma is a public health issue

“…An example of a task shifting approach is WHO’s Problem Management Plus, a low-intensity intervention for adults with symptoms of common mental health problems. This intervention uses lay helpers supervised by skilled mental health professionals in communities exposed to adversity (Dawson et al, 2015). In addition to more general mental health workforce strategies, several important efforts are underway by leaders in the trauma field to develop trauma-focused competencies to help mental health professionals build foundational trauma knowledge and skills (Bisson et al, 2010; Cook, Newman, & The New Haven Trauma Competency Group, 2014; Layne et al, 2014).…”

Training the next generation of psychotraumatologists: COllaborative Network for Training and EXcellence in psychoTraumatology (CONTEXT)

“…Evidence suggests that non-specialized personnel can provide psychological care, and that their work contributes towards reducing the treatment gap between demand and availability of mental health services for refugees, asylum seekers, and internally displaced persons (Sijbrandij et al, 2017; Van Ginneken et al, 2013). Project 1 aims to assess the feasibility of one of WHO’s scalable psychological interventions (Problem Management Plus) (Dawson et al, 2015) as delivered by Red Cross staff and volunteers to forcibly displaced migrants. Feasibility will be assessed in terms of acceptability, practicality, and effectiveness.…”