Emergency Toolkit

Psychological First Aid - Guide for Field Workers

This guide covers psychological first aid which involves humane, supportive and practical help to fellow human beings suffering serious crisis events. It is written for people in a position to help others who have experienced an extremely distressing event. It gives a framework for supporting people in ways that respect their dignity, culture and abilities. Despite its name, psychological first aid covers both social and psychological support.

Clinical Management of Mental, Neurological and Substance Use Conditions in Humanitarian Emergencies - mhGAP Humanitarian Intervention Guide (mhGAP-HIG)

The mhGAP Humanitarian Intervention Guide contains first-line management recommendations for mental, neurological and substance use conditions for non-specialist health-care providers in humanitarian emergencies where access to specialists and treatment options is limited. It also specifically focuses upon Mental Health conditions arising in humanitarian emergencies. For planning a mental health response in primary health care (PHC), please refer to Tool 5: Checklist for integrating mental health in PHC in humanitarian settings (page 47-52) in the UNHCR/WHO Assessing Mental Health and Psychosocial Needs and Resources Toolkit for Humanitarian Settings.

Psychological First Aid Training Manual for Child Practitioners

The manual to facilitate training in psychological first aid with a focus on children. The training programme develops skills for providing physical and emotional comfort by modelling calmness and enables a constructive format through active listening that allows children in distress to voice their concerns and needs. It also helps to connect children in distress to practical assistance through referral networks and information on positive coping strategies. This material also covers support to caregivers. Available in Arabic, English, French, and Spanish.

Training of Health-Care Providers Training Manual (ToHP) for mhGAP-IG

The ToHP training aims to ensure that health-care providers attain core competencies in delivering care for people with mental, neurological and substance use (MNS) conditions. In the ToHP training manual, 12 core competencies have been developed, which cover all areas needed to assess and manage each priority MNS condition. The manual is available in English and there are videos also available.

Psychological First Aid for Children II: Dealing With Traumatic Responses in Children

The PFA II, Dealing with traumatic responses in children manual provides guidance for staff working with children who are severely affected psychologically by acute crisis. It is not a clinical tool and does not in itself qualify staff to engage in clinical interventions. This tool lays the foundation for providing PFA as a basic psychological support. However, in some situations, it appears that methods such as comfort and stabilization are not sufficient. PFA II is supplementary to the basic PFA training. It provides advice for non-psychologists, based on field experience, and research. It provides advice to staff dealing directly with children who are showing concerning behaviours.

Psychological First Aid: Five Year Retrospective (2011-2016)

Commissioned and supported by Church of Sweden Peer reviewed by members of the Inter-Agency Standing Committee Reference Group on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings

Psychological First Aid During Ebola Virus Disease Outbreaks

This guide focuses on psychological first aid, which involves humane, supportive and practical help to fellow human beings suffering serious crisis events. It is written for people who can help others experiencing an extremely distressing event. This guide is an adaptation of the Psychological first aid: Guide for field workers. It has been adapted to better respond to the challenges of Ebola virus disease outbreaks. Ebola poses specific problems for affected people (e.g., stigmatization, isolation, fear, and possible abandonment), their caregivers and responders (e.g., safety, access to updated information).

I Support My Friends Resource Kit

The I Support My Friends resource kit has been developed to give facilitators a comprehensive package of tools and resources to best equip children and adolescents in safe and effective peer support, together with adult mentors. It provides guidance and tools for preparing, designing, and implementing trainings with children and adolescents in how to support a friend in distress. The resource kit also includes guidance for appropriate adult supervision to ensure the physical and emotional safety of child and adolescent helpers and the friends they support. The resource kit is comprised of: 1. Theory and Implementation Guide: Presents an overview of key concepts and the theoretical foundation of I Support My Friends. It describes the ethical considerations and child-safeguarding actions that need to be in place to protect children’s best interests and their physical and emotional safety. It also outlines the roles and responsibilities and expected skills and competencies of trusted adults who mentor child and adolescent peer supporters. 2. Training Manual: Outlines a three-day, step-by-step training in I Support My Friends, including case studies, stories and a list of required materials. The manual includes tools to support the preparation and implementation of the training. Some of the tools correspond to worksheets that participants will use during the training (these are marked with a footnote). 3. Participants Workbook: Contains the worksheets to be used by participants in the training. Each participant should receive their own workbook, which contains information, activities and space for notes and drawings. 4. Manual for Training of Facilitators and Focal Points: This is in progress currently and will include the materials needed to build the capacity of the adult facilitators and Focal Point(s) who will implement the training for children and adolescents. Once field tested, the package will include a training manual, agenda, PowerPoint slides and other guiding materials.

Problem Management Plus (PM+)

The manual describes a scalable psychological intervention called Problem Management Plus (PM+) for adults impaired by distress in communities who are exposed to adversity. Aspects of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) have been changed to make them feasible in communities that do not have many specialists. To ensure maximum use, the intervention is developed in such a way that it can help people with depression, anxiety and stress, whether or not exposure to adversity has caused these problems. It can be applied to improve aspects of mental health and psychosocial well-being no matter how severe people’s problems are.

Thinking Healthy: A Manual for Psychosocial Management of Perinatal Depression

The Thinking Health manual outlines an evidence-based approach describing how community health workers can reduce prenatal depression through evidence-based cognitive-behavioural techniques recommended by the mhGAP programme.

Group Problem Management Plus (Group PM+): group psychological help for adults impaired by distress in communities exposed to adversity (generic field-trial version 1.0)

With the unprecedented increase in humanitarian emergencies in recent years, growing numbers of people are facing adverse living conditions and are at risk of developing mental health problems. The defining feature of this manual – which was developed to help one individual at a time - is that it was designed to support adults impaired by distress, regardless of the specific mental health problem they are experiencing. This means that more people can be helped through a single brief psychosocial intervention. Secondly, it comprises evidence-based strategies adapted so that they can be delivered by supervised non-specialist providers after brief training. This is critical if we want to bridge the gap between mental health problems and access to effective care. In many settings where mental distress is high due to adversity there is a lack of psychosocial support, including a lack of mental health professionals. Group PM+ is designed for adults impaired by psychological distress and can be delivered by non-specialist professionals following brief training and with ongoing supervision. It draws on the same therapeutic strategies as the individual version of PM+ and is delivered over five two-hour sessions. The effectiveness and feasibility of Group PM+ has been shown through randomized controlled trials conducted in Pakistan and Nepal. With this manual, and following cultural adaptation, governments and civil society will be better equipped to respond to and manage common mental health problems for adults affected by adversity.

Group Interpersonal Therapy for Depression

This manual modifies Interpersonal Psychotherapy (IPT) for depression for use in 8-session groups and involves a simplified format for facilitators who may not have received previous training in mental health. The current guide uses the term Group Interpersonal Therapy (Group IPT) to aid dissemination and to clarify that IPT may be used by supervised non- specialists, including in countries where “psychotherapy” is a regulated term.

WHO Model List of Essential Medicines

Essential medicines are those that satisfy the priority health care needs of a population. They are selected with due regard to disease prevalence and public health relevance, evidence of efficacy and safety and comparative cost-effectiveness. They are intended to be available in functioning health systems at all times, in appropriate dosage forms, of assured quality and at prices individuals and health systems can afford.

Self Help Plus (SH+): A group-based stress management course for adults

Self-Help Plus (SH+) has been developed as a five-session, group-based stress management course. It is suitable for all settings where there are populations affected by adversity. It can be used to help reduce psychological distress in adults, regardless of whether they have a diagnosable mental health condition or not and has been shown to prevent the onset of mental disorders in adults. SH+ uses pre-recorded audio and an illustrated guide to teach stress management skills. This innovative format makes it possible for supervised non-specialists to complete a short training on SH+ and then deliver it to large groups of people (e.g. up to approximately 30 at a time). SH+ is one of a number of evidence-based scalable psychological interventions published by WHO and can be offered alongside other mental health interventions or community programming. This manual is for facilitators, supervisors and organizations implementing SH+. When we refer to “you” in the manual, we are addressing facilitators.