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Patricia Ibeziako, MD, came to the United States five-and-a-half years ago to study child psychiatry, a field that's virtually non-existent in Nigeria.
As a resident in Children's Hospital Boston's department of Psychiatry, Patricia Ibeziako was determined to address the barriers to health care she witnessed in Nigeria. "I grew up watching children struggle with emotional difficulties and there were no mental health professionals they could turn to," she says. This past March, Ibeziako traveled to Ibadan, Nigeria, where she grew up and attended medical school, to research the possibility of integrating mental health education into their school system. "After starting my Psychiatry residency in Nigeria, I felt helpless because I didn't know enough about how to address these issues," she says. "Now I'm fortunate to be in a position where I can help train educators within the country to develop basic skills for promoting positive mental health in children."
Mental illness is misunderstood and stigmatized throughout Nigeria, where it's often considered evidence of possession or witchcraft. Hospitals are only for physical problems, many parents believe, and symptoms of a child's psychiatric illness aren't usually reported to health providers. Ibeziako expected that teachers in her focus groups, reflecting the general cultural attitude, would resist discussing the taboo subject of mental health and reject Western treatments. But she discovered just the opposite. While the stigma persists in hospitals, the idea of addressing mental illness in schools, where awareness could be integrated into the curriculum, was acceptable to teachers. "They felt they were already expected to assume the role of counselors," she says, "but they needed and wanted mental health training to educate parents and help the kids." Now that Ibeziako and her colleagues have reported their findings to the Ministries of Health and Education, they hope to obtain support to return to Nigeria to implement school mental health training programs.
"My department has been so supportive," says Ibeziako, who is now a full-time attending in Children's Psychiatry Consultation Liaison service. She credits Dave DeMaso, MD, psychiatrist-in-chief, for granting her a one-month leave and encouraging her to apply for the House Officer Development Award that funded the trip. "With less than $10,000, we were able to conduct a research project on another continent that could potentially impact a lot of children," she says. And the benefit goes both ways, according to Ibeziako, who points out that international partnerships give Americans the chance to see how the African social bonds of community and family promote resilience in spite of poverty. "Learning about the developing world can give people in Massachusetts some perspective on their situation," Ibeziako says, "and show them how much can be overcome." |
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