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Mental health leadership and patient access to care: a public–private initiative in South Africa

Overview of attention for article published in International Journal of Mental Health Systems, September 2017
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Title
Mental health leadership and patient access to care: a public–private initiative in South Africa
Published in
International Journal of Mental Health Systems, September 2017
DOI 10.1186/s13033-017-0160-4
Pubmed ID
Authors

Christopher Paul Szabo, Jennifer Fine, Pat Mayers, Shan Naidoo, Tuviah Zabow, Mental Health Leadership Working Group

Abstract

Mental health leadership is a critical component of patient access to care. More specifically, the ability of mental health professionals to articulate the needs of patients, formulate strategies and engage meaningfully at the appropriate level in pursuit of resources. This is not a skill set routinely taught to mental health professionals. A public-private mental health leadership initiative, emanating from a patient access to care programme, was developed with the aim of building leadership capacity within the South African public mental health sector. The express aim was to equip health care professionals with the requisite skills to more effectively advocate for their patients. The initiative involved participants from various sites within South Africa. Inclusion was based on the proposal of an ongoing "project", i.e. a clinician-initiated service development with a multidisciplinary focus. The projects were varied in nature but all involved identification of and a plan for addressing an aspect of the participants' daily professional work which negatively impacted on patient care due to unmet needs. Six such projects were included and involved 15 participants, comprising personnel from psychiatry, psychology, occupational therapy and nursing. Each project group was formally mentored as part of the initiative, with mentors being senior professionals with expertise in psychiatry, public health and nursing. The programme design thus provided a unique practical dimension in which skills and learnings were applied to the projects with numerous and diverse outcomes. Benefits were noted by participants but extended beyond the individuals to the health institutions in which they worked and the patients that they served. Participants acquired both the skills and the confidence which enabled them to sustain the changes that they themselves had initiated in their institutions. The initiative gave impetus to the inclusion of public mental health as part of the curriculum for specialist training. Despite the significant adverse social and economic costs of mental illness, psychiatric and related services receive a low level of priority within the health care system. Ensuring that mental health receives the recognition and the resources it deserves requires that mental health care professionals become effective advocates through mental health leadership.

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The data shown below were collected from the profiles of 6 X users who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Mendeley readers

Mendeley readers

The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 99 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.

Geographical breakdown

Country Count As %
Unknown 99 100%

Demographic breakdown

Readers by professional status Count As %
Student > Master 16 16%
Student > Bachelor 9 9%
Other 6 6%
Lecturer 6 6%
Student > Doctoral Student 6 6%
Other 22 22%
Unknown 34 34%
Readers by discipline Count As %
Nursing and Health Professions 21 21%
Medicine and Dentistry 8 8%
Psychology 8 8%
Business, Management and Accounting 4 4%
Computer Science 3 3%
Other 21 21%
Unknown 34 34%
Attention Score in Context

Attention Score in Context

This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 4. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 25 July 2019.
All research outputs
#7,698,128
of 25,381,151 outputs
Outputs from International Journal of Mental Health Systems
#427
of 759 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#110,008
of 320,662 outputs
Outputs of similar age from International Journal of Mental Health Systems
#12
of 20 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 25,381,151 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 69th percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 759 research outputs from this source. They typically receive more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 9.1. This one is in the 42nd percentile – i.e., 42% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 320,662 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one has gotten more attention than average, scoring higher than 65% of its contemporaries.
We're also able to compare this research output to 20 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 40th percentile – i.e., 40% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.