On top of ESSSWA’s capacity building/training activities made over the previous year, it has currently trained 30 psychosocial professionals in mental health recovery approaches with ultimate aim of preventing child abuse in those families affected by mental health problem. The training was designed by the request of ESSSWA’s member, Maji H/Mariam a Social Worker and Ph.D. candidate in the field of psychiatric epidemiology at Addis Ababa University. ESSSWA, appreciates Maji’s Mandella Fellowship mentor Paul R. Sachs (PhD, NHS Human Services, Philadelphia, USA) who volunteered to come to Ethiopia and freely deliver this training. The aim was to provide recovery and resiliency oriented mental health training to participants in Ethiopia. Mental health treatment resources are scarce in Ethiopia and those treatment resources that are available rely on a biomedical model of care.
The specific objectives were then: (i) to provide information about an alternative model of care which does not replace the biomedical model but rather supplements it and (ii) to develop a model of training in this subject that can be used further for social work practitioners in Ethiopia and (iii) to reduce the negative impact of families with mental health on the well-being of children. The training was conducted in cooperation with Hyder Hospital in Mekele and in cooperation with Addis Ababa University Department of Social Work for two days each.