Mental Health of Refugees (WHO - OMS, 1996, 142 p.): Back Cover

Mental Health of Refugees (WHO - OMS, 1996, 142 p.)

		(introduction...)
		Acknowledgements
		Introduction
		Unit 1. Useful helping skills
		Unit 2. Stress and relaxation
		Unit 3. Functional complaints
		Unit 4. Common mental disorders
		Unit 5. Helping refugee children
		Unit 6. Traditional medicine and traditional healers
		Unit 7. Alcohol and other drug problems
		Unit 8. Helping victims of torture and other violence
		Unit 9. Helping victims of rape and their communities
		Unit 10. The organization of services that promote the mental health and well-being of refugees
		Selected WHO publications of related interest
		Back Cover

Back Cover

The plight of refugees has been well documented. Their need for food, shelter and protection is widely recognized. Concern for refugees' mental health, however, has too long been neglected.

This manual - intended for those who work with refugees and other displaced persons or who aim to assist them - looks at the mental health problems that are all too common in persons who have fled their homes and countries. War and natural disasters cause stress, terror, loss and bereavement. These may in turn be compounded by the effects of torture or rape.

The manual describes the mental health impact of these and other traumatic experiences. It gives practical advice on how to help refugees and other displaced persons through counselling, self-help groups, modern drugs and traditional medicine. There is a special section on the mental health of refugee children.

The refugee experience begins with fear and often progresses, amid all kinds of physical hardship and difficulty, to a state of hopelessness and despair. This manual cannot change the situation in which refugees find themselves. Rather, its aim is to strengthen refugees' own capacity to face up to, and perhaps even overcome, the desperate situation they are in.

Price: Sw.fr. 30.-
Price in developing countries: Sw.fr. 21.-

ISBN 92 4 154486 4