Mental health is a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), one in four patients visiting a health facility has at least one mental, neurological or behavioural disorder but most of these disorders are neither diagnosed nor treated. Mental illnesses affect and are affected by chronic conditions such as cancer, heart and cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and HIV/AIDS. Untreated, they bring about unhealthy behaviour, non-compliance with prescribed medical regimens, diminished immune functioning, and poor prognosis.
So far, a powerful body of evidences has shed light on the extent to which our environments shape our health. Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs), toxic stress response and psychological trauma are the origin of preventable root causes of the most of health and social challenges facing the population. ACEs are 10 categories of adversities in three domains experienced before 18 years old: child abuse (physical, emotional, or sexual); neglect (physical or emotional); and household challenges (growing up with household incarceration, mental illness, substance dependence, parental separation or divorce, or intimate partner violence). Even if this science is important, it is most useful when put into practice in the purpose to improve the health and the lives of people. Trauma-Informed Care is a new approach suitable for all human services provision. It includes awareness of the prevalence of psychological trauma and environmental adversities in population and understanding of the impacts of psychological trauma on physical, mental and behavioral health. The main purpose of Trauma-Informed Care implementation in health services basically in Mental Health Department of CHUB is to prevent inadvertent retraumatization of our clients and vicarious traumatization of service providers.
Below is our contact address for further information:
HEAD OF DEPARTMENT
Dr. RUDASINGWA Vedaste
Contact number: +250 789660010
OUR MISSION
The mission of the Mental Health Department of CHUB is to provide comprehensive and patient-centered care and promote mental health and wellness of the population by implementing primary, secondary and preventive interventions of mental, physical and behaviour disorders.
Tertiary prevention: we have mission to provide high quality of mental health care to the individuals who have already developed mental, physical or behavioral health problems in the purpose to lessen the severity, progression, or complications associated with those problems.
Secondary prevention: we are striving for early detection of the population harmfully exposed to the environmental adversities in the purpose to prevent the development of mental, physical and behavioral health problems.
Primary prevention: our final target is to prevent harmful exposures of the population especially children to environmental adversities so that we can have healthy population that can cope with the normal stresses of life, work productively and fruitfully, and make a contribution to our community. To achieve above targets, investments in cross-sector policies and programs that promote stable, safe, and nurturing relationships and environments and build Trauma-Informed Network of Care in all human services is required.
OUR SERVICES
We are providing the following services:
- Psychiatric consultation
-Psychotherapy: individual, group, couple, family
-Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry
-Laboratory for Electroencephalography (EEG)
-Teaching and Training
-Clinical supervisions to Provincial and District Hospitals within Hospital catchment area
-Research