Getting creative with mental health

The efforts of Partners In Health and its sister organization in Haiti, Zanmi Lasante (ZL), as they accompany Haiti’s small psychiatric community to build back betterwere featured on the front page of the August 6 edition of Psychiatric News, the American Psychiatric Association’s bimonthly newspaper. With the country’s physical wounds beginning to heal, medical efforts are increasingly focusing on Haiti’s mental health and psychosocial needs.

“Haiti, an independent nation with a distinct culture…will have to take the lead in building the [country’s] mental health infrastructure,” writes the piece’s author, Aaron Levin. He points to Haitian leaders, such as Father Eddy Eustache, the psychologist and priest who heads  ZL’s Mental Health and Psychosocial Program, as integral to the movement. “Outsiders may contribute to that process but probably through Haitian or Haitian-American practitioners whose main job will be to train more Haitians to do most of the clinical work required,” writes Levin. “Father Eddy Eustache is just such a bridge.”

Read the full article in Psychiatric News.

Read a past interviews with Father Eddy. 

Read more about PIH’s mental health and psychosocial response to the January 12 earthquake.