Mental health counselling available for COVID-19 patients, recovered cases

Recognising the significant mental health complications which may arise out of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Health Ministry is opening its services to persons who are affected and in need of assistance.
Health Minister Dr Frank Anthony declared on Wednesday that the Mental Health Unit is open to facilitate anyone requiring counselling. In addition, since last year, health workers have been trained at the primary level to detect instances of mental health complications among those who visit the Health Ministry’s facilities.
“Here, in the Ministry, we have a Mental Health Unit, and if there are persons that require counselling, they can go to that Unit, where our counsellors would provide that sort of counselling. But generally, we have been offering a service at the level of the health centres, because, over the last year, we would have trained a number of doctors in the primary healthcare setting to look out for mental health conditions, especially those associated with COVID,” Dr Anthony explained.
The Minister explained that the consequences of contracting the virus, such as mandatory isolation and other factors, can cause persons to develop mental health conditions.
“We know that persons who might have been exposed to COVID, if they have to quarantine, there might be a lot of anxiety and worry. In some cases, persons who are sick can get depressed, (creating) more problems for their ongoing condition. So, they may require some type of help. We have trained our staff to offer that type of help,” he said.
However, even after persons recover, “long COVID” could take months to completely recuperate from. As such, assistance is required until those patients are back to some level of normalcy. For some people, COVID can cause symptoms that last for weeks or months after the infection has gone. This is sometimes called post-COVID-19 syndrome, or ‘long COVID’.
He shared, “We have also seen that even after persons have recovered, they can have mental health challenges, because one of the forms of long COVID can be with persons that experience brain fog, meaning that they can get confused and so forth. In the midst of a conversation, they can get confused and that sort of thing. There is that as well, and these persons might require assistance for another six months or so.”
In September, it was announced that a multi-disciplinary team would be established to analyse the condition and treat recovered patients suffering from long COVID.
One month ago, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said a social media campaign was created to raise awareness of the sustained burden the COVID-19 pandemic poses on the mental health of frontline health workers, and is inviting them to share their stories and strategies to better manage and cope with this added challenge.
Preliminary data from the COVID-19 “HEalth caRe wOrkErS” (HEROES) study, a collaboration between the University of Chile, Columbia University in the United States, and PAHO, indicate that between five per cent and 15 per cent of respondents in several countries in the Americas reported suicidal thoughts in the two weeks prior to being consulted for the survey. Between 15 per cent and 22 per cent reported symptoms compatible with depression. (G12)