The Mental Health Authority, in collaboration with the Databank Foundation, is raising awareness about the mental well-being of employees in their places of work.
This effort aligns with the Authority’s agenda of educating the public on the importance of cultivating a mentally healthy environment during the “Purple Month of May.”
Speaking to Citi News at a seminar dubbed “Strategies for Mental Health and Wellness Success in Workplaces” held in Accra, the Chief Psychiatrist at the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, Dr Kwadwo Marfo Obeng, identified some dominant mental health challenges among workers such as anxiety, stress and in some cases, depression.
He also noted substance abuse such as alcohol, as a cause of mental health challenges and stressed the need for both managers and employees, to undergo mental health training.
“At least 15% of the working population is dealing with a mental health issue at any given point in time. This is an international statistic but it will be around that in Ghana. You are looking at the person’s work environment, the nature of the person’s work whether they are doing work that is extremely demanding or overly competitive or whether the person has channels of communication so that if they have a challenge they can deal with it.
“And training your managers to be able to identify people who have issues and intervene quickly. And develop plans to intervene when they are having a mental problem,” Dr, Obeng emphasised.
Clinical Psychologist at the University of Ghana Medical School, Seth Mawusi Asafo, also advocated for mental health to be a much talked about subject, in our working environment.
“We know that sometimes our stifling work environment can cause people to develop a lot of stress and predispose them to having physical and mental health conditions.
“It’s important for us to talk about mental health within institutions. That active awareness is what brings people to a place where they want to even start doing something about it,” he stated.
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