Raaji collaborates with Uridu and Correlaid to conduct mental health assessment of rural women
As the world becomes more uncertain, mental illness is becoming more apparent among communities, but we still don't talk about it because of the stigmas and shame associated with it. Mental health issues are more prevalent in communities where racism, adversity, and traditional exclusion from health, educational, social, and economic resources exist. While the prevalence of mental illness is equal in rural and urban areas, the services provided vary greatly. Unfortunately, people in such communities are unaware of their mental health issues, and a lack of proper resources and facilities worsens the situation.
Raaji brings mental health subject in Sindh's rural areas
We found a great opportunity to bring mental health to rural areas along with our incredible partners Uridu and Correlaid. We already have strong digital connections with our rural digital champions who are active leaders and change makers in their communities. We thought about discussing mental health with them, when Corelaid provided us with a short and easy digital mental health survey.
The project started in early October, we supported our partners in translating and recording the survey content and then we received the final version of the survey. Correlaid and Uridu worked together to build Mental Distress Screening consisting of 10 questions based on WHO SRQ-20 Index and also 20 self reporting questions to effectively assess and identify major depression, anxiety disorders or suicidality. Aurat Raaj was the implementation partner to make sure that the survey is well-understood and utilised by the participants in a local context. The survey has 10 simple questions The scale ranged from 0 to 10, with higher scores indicating mental health issues.
How did we run the survey digitally?
We started by making a tutorial video to help them understand the campaign and its significance. We then showed them how to run the survey on their phones and provided them data plans. When completing the survey, participants had the option to share their results with us by clicking the Whatsapp button at the end. They all willingly shared their results with us.
We surveyed 30 participants, including our digital champions, and the rest were invited to our two Raaji Rooms in rural Sindh, which are actually digital hubs run by two very talented Raaji Room leaders, Uzma and Urbeli. These participants belongs to 22 different villages of interior Sindh including Shadan Jatoi, Pir Bux Brohi, Pir Jo Goth, Zakariya Mahessar, Jhando Sehro, Lashkari Chandio, Jeeyan Abro, Khair Bux Mari, Bharmi, Gaji Jhatial, Wahid Bux Gopang, Maid Shaheed, Kumbi Sandila, Karam Khan, Labour Colony, Dundh, Thori Suhrab, Sachi Bux Jagiranni, Saindad Khan, Bakhshal Khakhrani, Dost Muhammad Metlo and Gul Muhammad Jarwar. The majority of the villages mentioned here have no presence on the Internet; these are all small and medium settlements in the rural Sindh districts of Larkana and KamberShahdadkot.
To showcase the effectiveness of this survey we partnered with GRC Global Resource Consulting to publish a White paper which was based on the interviews of seven participants.
Participants Scoring
The participants' scores ranged from 0 to 7, with 7 of them scoring zero, indicating that they are in good mental health and happy in their routine life. Six participants scored 6 and three participants scored 7, implying that they were dealing with mental health concerns. There were some common observations that we found during conversation with the participants, that includes:
Participants were happy to share their results and scores with us
They never thought or heard about mental health before this campaign
When we dig deeper into the conversation we found different reasons of this unawareness:
Greater emphasis on family care, as most women think more about their families
Women are burdened by other problems and duties, as they already have so many issues related to family, income, health or educational expenses that they don’t even consider mental health a serious issue.
Generally, nobody usually discusses mental health issues in the communities.
Questions Recalled by participants: Having headaches, loss of energy, having sleeping issues and also playing a useful part in community activities. This might be the fact that participants who scored higher might be facing these problems in daily lives.
All participants understood questions & the instructions were supportive to them.
No other technical problem except the low internet connectivity in some areas.
The participants' reactions to the results were mixed. Participants who scored lower were relieved to learn that they were doing well in their lives, whereas those who scored higher have begun to think over their mental health issues and are attempting to resolve them by controlling their anger or even sharing their problems with friends.
Some participants expressed their thoughts on what further could be included in this survey or what issues trigger mental health problems or stress. One of them said that chronic health problems and inability to pay bills might have an impact on mental health, while another stated that females who do not have access to education feel depressed. As a result, issues such as health, finances, poverty, and a lack of opportunity to grow all have an impact on mental health.
We are happy to see that our rural digital champions, who never thought about mental health, had developed such a strong interest in the subject that they had begun spreading awareness in their communities. Here’s what one of the participants shared:
“This was the first time we were offered to think about our mental health. We were working and using our mind but we never focused on our mental health. So this is the support from your side that we analyzed ourselves mentally and also spread this message in our communities that how important it is to be mentally fresh as we are doing our work and jobs with our minds.”
Way forward
This research brings up many potential actions for us to learn more about mental health awareness in underprivileged communities, such as rural women and girls who lack access to information, resources, and services to help them manage their mental health and psychological issues. Now we're ready to have new partnerships with mental health startups, create content around mental and reproductive health links, invite experts to speak to our rural audiences, or influence communities to take small daily steps to improve their mental health, such as meditation, peer discussions, breathing exercises, or Yoga.