Focus on Depression for Mental Health Week 2012

BASSETERRE, St. Kitts, 5th October 2012: In commemoration of World Mental Health Day which is celebrated annually on October 10th, the Mental Health Association will be taking the opportunity to highlight Mental Health issues by using the week October 7th to October 14th as Mental Health Week.

Under the theme, ‘Depression: A Global Crisis’, the Mental Health Team in collaboration with the Counseling Department within the Ministry of Community Development, Culture and Gender Affairs will be hosting a series of activities including talks in schools by guidance counselors, information spots on radio, a march, and a panel discussion in collaboration with NEMA.

On Wednesday Ms. Michele de la Coudray-Blake Director of the Counseling Department will meet with doctors at their weekly gathering for a discussion on the importance of referring clients diagnosed with depression to counseling. The Counseling Department’s staff will also play an integral role on Thursday 11th October at Patient Treat Day here approximately thirty patients and their families will be engaged in a series of activities that will seek to address the issue of Psycho-Education, support, and compliance with regard to the management of Depression.

The Ministry of Community Development acknowledges the mental health team and the Mental Health Association for their ongoing work in helping to change the negative perceptions and attitudes towards mental illness and encourages all citizens to contemplate on the following quotation by renowned author and journalist Renata Adler, “nothing defines the quality of life in a community more clearly that people who regard themselves, or whom the consensus chooses to regard, as mentally unwell”.