Mental health training in Somaliland - Day 28

Friday 18^th October

Today was officially the weekend, though we decided to meet as the mental health group, in view of a lack of time available before the 5^th year teaching next week. Myself, Dr. Jibril, Dr. Zainab, Dr. Gurguurte and Aidrous all met as a group. This was the first meeting of this kind in Borama and it was a delight to spend time with the group and discuss matters to do with mental health. The team here are very keen to be involved further and we had an interesting discussion to start with about psychopharmacology and importantly, poly-pharmacy, as it is so often used here. This proved to be useful and we agreed to continue the talk tomorrow on the mental ward, whilst looking at real patient notes. We discussed the potential plan for further integration of psychiatry into the 5^th year medical student curriculum and also discussed further potential input that could be offered, in terms of mental health. Following the meeting, I meet with Zainab, the mental health rep and we discuss and review the lectures she will present next week as part of the medical student teaching.