Mental Health Unit at Mulago Hospital

After seeing the Nutrition Unit, we headed over to the Mental Health Unit where Dr. Musisi was able to show us his work environment. This was the first time either my dad or I had seen a ward of this kind anywhere in the developing world.

Dad and Grand Challenges Canada Program Officer Karlee Silver with Dr. Musisi

As we walked along the path to the psychiatric wards, we met a woman who looked as though she had a mental health condition. She shook each of our hands and asked my name, and walked quietly along with us. I think a bit of kindness goes a long way with someone like her, who faces so much stigma as a mentally ill patient in the developing world.

We were first shown the outpatient facility, where there were residential rooms, a treatment room, areas for group therapy, and rooms for one-on-one therapy. There weren’t any patients in the facility at the time, since the patients all come to clinics in the morning, so we got the full tour from a nurse who showed us around.

A group therapy area in the outpatient facility

Next we went to the inpatient facility, where there are separate wards for men and women. We went and saw both. Each patient had an attendant and some had friends by their bedsides. We didn’t interact much with the patients, but a few were glad to return a smile and a wave.

We passed by the nurses’ station where two young nurses sat at a table beside a medicine cart. We asked what medicines were used and the nurses listed a number of older psychiatric medicines like amytriptilline and haldol. There didn’t seem to be any access to newer, more effective, and more expensive drugs.

Medicine cart in the nurses' station

We were fortunate to be able to see an occupational therapy session, where patients sat around a table and got to choose an activity they enjoyed. Most were doing crafts like knitting or painting. I looked at one of the patient’s paintings and saw she had depicted a face. Perhaps her own?

As I watched her paint, the woman who had been walking with us earlier came up to me and untied the bright orange sash I was wearing around my waist on my dress. She carefully tied another bow and I thanked her for it as the nurse gave her a supportive pat on the shoulder.

Inside the facility is an office where we met a young man involved in a community project. He told us that the project works with communities to encourage community-based care and understanding of mental illness. It was very impressive and made me hopeful that he and those like him could fight the battle against stigma surrounding mental illness.

A poster in the office of the community project

I had the impression that although the staff provide good care, the ward only reached a tiny proportion of the population suffering mental illness in Uganda. I left feeling glad, though, that in however small a way, here were doctors, nurses, and members of the community making a difference in the lives of people with mental illness.