Betterby30me

I'd love to hear more about the role of MSF mental health officers, in providing psychosocial aid (or is it more of an administrative role?). I am currently working on gaining deeper clinical skills in community mental health care, and am interested in also learning how MSF operates in the same, given the scarce-resource limitations of humanitarian work. I'm doing an MA in Social Work in Mental Health in India at the moment, with previous training in disaster psychosocial care as well as internship/work experience in post-conflict and gradual-onset disaster settings.

Totally agreed, Dr. Karunakara. Even when I first finished training in disaster psychosocial care, I found it tough to place myself in an organization or setting that would help build on skills and expertise, as not many agencies in India saw any scope for such skills (admittedly, I was a greenhorn back then). Mental healthcare receives little attention in general settings (the organization I'm currently training under is MHAT [www.mhatkerala.org] and it seeks to provide mental health services to the extremely poor), so it's not difficult to imagine how it fares in humanitarian aid situations. Thank you for answering my query, and I look forward to following MSF's stellar work more closely!