Project Close-Out Meeting with Zonal Representative

Today, March 23, 2016, Gede Foundation’s team held an end-of-project meeting with its South-West Zonal Representative.  The meeting was a bitter-sweet event as it was a mixture of a sense of accomplishment due to HAF-2 project completion whichreached 4,092 adults in two local government areas of Oyo state with   minimum prevention package intervention for HIV-AIDS(MPPI)  and nostalgia as our Zonal Representative temporarily leaves Gede’s employment domain. 

During the meeting, a general review of the project was conducted, lessons learned were discussed and recorded and necessary transition and handing-over process was observed.  It was also an opportunity for the team to go down memory lane when the zonal office was first opened in 2010.  After almost 6 years of continuous operation in the SW and a lot of lessons learned from OVC and HIV-AIDS prevention projects, Gede will be temporarily closing its doors in the zone only to pave way to another project that will bring stigmatized and underserved health burdens out of the shadows. 

As the old cliché says, “every end translates to a new beginning”. 

Gede and BasicNeeds Ghana

No one organization can claim to have impacted enough to the lives and wellbeing of the ‘vulnerable’ populations. Indeed, this explains why Gede Foundation hosted Peter Yaro from BasicNeeds Ghana in Abuja within the week of 1-5 February 2016 to share experiences on their programmes, and promote more opportunities for possible future collaboration.

In addition to other engagements within the visit, Peter was able to meet with Gede’s Team Members including the Board Members, Communities and a Behavioural Medicine Healthcare Facility.

The common area of interest revolved around mental health, in which, the two organizations are seeking ways to expand within the West African sub-region.

In visiting Mpape and Dutse communities (where most of Gede’s beneficiaries reside), Peter noted the overwhelming similarities that exist between the two countries which include communal coexistent and the central role played by community gatekeepers in sustaining viable initiatives. This community setting is a pointer to the possibility replication of Ghana’s BasicNeeds’ mental health care model in Nigeria’s communities

Gede Foundation joins as BasicNeeds’ first franchisee in Nigeria

Gede is delighted to report that the Foundation has joined BasicNeeds as its first social franchisee in Nigeria. The project is supported by Grand Challenges Canada (funded by the Government of Canada) and is aimed at scaling-up community based mental health care and support in East and West Africa. Through the project, Gede will reach 1800 people living with mental illness and epilepsy in Abuja over a two year period.

 John Minto, Managing Director of Gede remarks, “the Foundation supports the Government of Nigeria’s

approach to mental illness which is based on a holistic understanding of the roles which community based diagnosis, treatment and livelihoods play. Through the BasicNeeds Model, Gede will help clients to return to a normal life, which includes being productive members of both their families and communities. The partnership also represents an important learning opportunity for Gede which seeks to lead in the area of mental health advocacy in Nigeria”.
To keep in touch with the project’s progress please return regularly to www.gedefoundation.org and www.basicneeds.org

Board of Directors’ Meeting- Gede Foundation

Gede’s Board of Directors met on March 14, 2016 in order to discuss the strategic direction of the Foundation, as well as to perform the oversight function required of them. At the meeting, senior Managers presented an overview of the Foundation’s 2015 programme, as well as a summary of current activities and the direction which Gede seeks to grow in the future. As always, the Foundation’s supportive Board offered technical advice and encouragement in equal measure.

Gede’s Board is complemented by several subcommittee meetings which are held regularly through the year, both face-to-face and virtually due to the engagement of ICT; Gede is able to continue with its operations while securing appropriate oversight from the most senior figures in the Foundation.

In 2016, the focus of almost all discussions was on the projects currently being designed and delivered which will help to secure for Gede a growing reputation for impact, innovation and influence. The Board meeting was followed by a visit to the Behavioural Medicine Unit of Karu Hospital, where patients with mental illnesses are managed.

Recognize your stressors and use them to your advantage!

It’s bad enough that people are suffering from stigma associated with mental illnesses and burdens such as stress, but recent research indicates that one can also benefit from the ‘good’ side of it.

With adequate knowledge and good training, one can actually exploit stress in the workplace for ‘positive’ gains rather than ‘managing’ it. Gede’s workplace programme exposes participants to ways in which they can explore the perceived dangers of stress and turn them to their advantage.

Stress, when harnessed properly, can have numerous benefits for the body and mind. But in order to use stress to our advantage, it's important first to understand what exactly causes it and, if everyone tells us to avoid it, then how can it actually help us?

To this point, Gede approaches stress as a survival tool – something which we can all use to our advantage when we address it head-on. Think about some stressful situations that we consciously put ourselves in to make life more interesting and enjoyable- some people appear at their ‘best’ when deadline approaches fast and near!!

So while we may not be the first generation to have faced this amount of stress, we may be the first with the knowledge to turn what has always been considered a negative, into a true positive outcome.

Book your place on Gede’s Managing Stress in the Workplace Programme and feel the difference!!

Gede and CCM explore the impact of Mental Health on other Disease Burdens

The meeting between Gede’s Managing Director, Mr John Minto and the Chairman of Nigeria’s Country Coordinating Mechanism, Dr Dauda Suleiman, explored ways in which the two organizations can continue to support the national response to disease burden. The Global Fund grants are coordinated through the CCM and are framed by the specific country context in which they are written.

 The disease burden of HIV-AIDS, TB and Malaria are relatively well known and recognised. What is less recognised and understood is the link between, for example, common mental disorders and new HIV infections, as well as adherence to HIV medication.

Gede and CCM acknowledge the significance of mental health, especially, in care outcomes for people living with HIV-AIDS and the impacts on treatment cost.

A communication loop as been established to circulate relevant information among the two organizations (including Gede’s Prevalence Study Report on Depression, Alcohol Abuse and Suicidality) among 1000 people living with HIV-AIDS in the FCT to CCM members and also to advocate for inclusion of mental health services across board.

WOMEN AND MENTAL HEALTH

The World Health Organization talks about issues related to gender disparities and mental health in its publication (http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/genderwomen/en/) stressing that “overall rates of psychiatric disorder are almost identical for men and women but striking gender differences are found in the patterns of mental illness”.  In summary, it cites that women are two times more likely than men to develop certain mental health conditions like depression, eating disorders, and panic disorders.

Women are also two to three times more likely to attempt suicide, although four times more men die from suicide.  Symptoms can also differ between men and women, so it’s important to understand the different factors that can contribute to each illness. For example, females tend to report more physical symptoms in relation to mental illness. These can include fatigue, loss of appetite, restlessness, nausea, and headaches (www.dualdiagnosis.org). 

Today, March 8th, as we celebrate International Women’s Day, we at Gede Foundation invite you to join us as we raise awareness on mental health as they relate to various cohorts and marginalized populations in our society, especially women.   

Gede observed Country Coordinating Mechanism’s meeting of the Global Fund

The new funding model is based on allocations. In the current cycle covering 2014-2016, eligible countries including Nigeria received an upfront allocation, which provided improved predictability of funding.

The Country Coordinating Mechanism (CCM) in Nigeria is mandated to facilitate all Global Fund Grants disbursement in-country and supervise selections of principal and sub recipients.

Starting from the Country’s national strategic plan, stakeholders including Gede Foundation (as observer at the meeting) participated in an ongoing country dialogue and review of outstanding issues related to the process of selecting implementers on March 2 2016. Development partners, donors and grant recipients anticipated an all-inclusive engagement of key players within the three disease burdens. Gede’s involvement with the activities of CCM is to add values   to the meeting outcomes, and to offer its contributions regarding the links between mental health and HIV-AIDS, which is noted in the prevalence study undertaken by Gede in 2015-2016 and sees the CCM as an important channel for advocacy work for the integration.

Check this site to share with the result of the study later in the year.

Demand versus Supply- Unending Vulnerability

The number of orphans and vulnerable children (OVC) in Nigeria is estimated at 17.5 million, out of which 7.3 million are orphaned by HIV-AIDS, most especially (and understandably) in those States which have recorded high prevalence rates. For children living outside the care of biological parents, the situation is assumed to be the most overwhelming, particularly, in low income countries. Neglect, discrimination and malnutrition affect orphans more commonly than their non-orphaned peers.

The Addax Oryx Foundation programme run by Gede is addressing some of these needs by reaching out to impoverished households in rural communities to lay foundations for a productive future for orphans. Thousands of orphans have been re-enrolled into secondary and vocational schools, provided with nutritional support and empowered to start their businesses. In the midst of this, there are still huge gaps in terms of limited resources to match with the demand.

Due to the overwhelming demand for services to orphans and vulnerable children in rural communities, there is need to revert to guidance from tools such as the Child Vulnerability Index Enrollment Card in order to pick the most vulnerable cases due to limited resources. The enrollment exercise for 2016 is ongoing in twelve communities in the FCT and within few weeks, other activities will follow. We are using this medium to thank our past and present donors, for investing into the future of this vulnerable population and, reaching out to as many as would want to address the plight of orphans in Nigeria. You can contact Godwin Etim via godwin@gedefoundation.org for more information.

STRESS- THE UNENDING BATTLE IN THE MIND

You may feel there’s nothing you can do about stress. The bills won’t stop coming, there are never enough hours in the day, and your work and family responsibilities will always be demanding. But you have more control over stress than you might think. Stress management is all about taking charge of your lifestyle, thoughts, emotions, and the way you deal with problems – problems, by the way, which we all face on a daily basis. No matter how stressful your life seems, there are steps you can take to relieve the pressure and regain control.

Research from around the world indicates that the modern work environment can expose employees to potential risks (sometimes unnoticed), which can cause serious, though often slow burning, negative impact on both employee and employer. At the end, stress is linked to workplace productivity outcomes and should be considered as a factor in setting up workplace policies. As more is known about stress in the workplace, there is an increasing need to ensure that programmes to address the impact of stress are focused on ‘site specific’ issues-general programmes which have tended to focus on time management and /or a general overview of stress have their uses, but more focused site specific actions are needed.

The sources of stress in one’s life and occupation may differ and as such, Gede Foundation’s “Managing Stress in Workplace Programme’’ targets specific workplace stressors and address them with full engagement  of both employees and employers. You can reach out to Godwin Etim via godwin@gedefoundation.org  to address stress as it relates to your workplace.