Albert Persaud

Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience · King's College London, London, UK

Professor Dinesh Bhugra, whose illustrious career in psychiatry spans nearly 5 decades, continues to collaborate with healthcare professionals, policymakers, patients, and caregiver groups worldwide, assuming multifaceted roles with unparalleled dedication. As a distinguished educator, researcher, writer, and mentor, he bridges diverse disciplines...

Geopsychiatry, a newly emerging discipline within psychiatry, examines the influence of geopolitical determinants on mental health and mental illness. Geopolitical determinants include conflict and wars, global austerity, climate change, public health crises (such as the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‑19)), and migration. This study focuses on the...

Geopolitical determinants of health have been well recognized by the World Health Organization and are increasingly being discussed across governments, institutions, academics, policy makers, and across global health sector. Geopolitical determinants of health are events, structures, processes, and factors that influence individual health including...

Background The CAPE Vulnerability Index serves as a worldwide foreign policy indicator that implies which countries should get assistance first. It provides an evidence-based, well-structured, and well-reasoned strategy for employing aid in bilateral arrangements with mental health as a basis. Objective The second edition of the CAPE VI has been d...

Climate changes affect planet ecosystems, living beings, humans, including their lives, rights, economy, housing, migration, and both physical and mental health. Geo-psychiatry is a new discipline within the field of psychiatry studying the interface between various geo-political factors including geographical, political, economic, commercial and c...

Human beings are social animals, and social psychiatry is a key discipline within psychiatry around the world. The impact of social factors on the genesis and perpetuation of mental illnesses and maintenance of well-being of individuals and families is well recognized. Exploring social factors is the key to understanding aetiology and developing th...

Website of WACP, https://waculturalpsy.org/wacp-news/stigma-of-mental-illness-and-covid-19/.

Due to health and social inequalities, migrants’ health and mental health has been disproportionately impacted during the Covid-19 pandemic. Migrant communities have been in fact particularly affected by high infection rates, isolation, discrimination, losing employment, or being underemployed in jobs which is difficult to maintain social distancin...

Introduction: The CAPE Vulnerability Index is a global foreign policy index that identifies the countries to be prioritise for foreign aid. It offers an evidenced, structured and reasoned approach to using aid in bi-lateral agreements with mental health as a foundation. The present version is specifically design for Latin America and Caribbean (LAC...

Article was first sent to publisher in July 2020. Highlighting how COVID-19 has exacerbated gender-based violence, yet there was a delay in protecting victims of abuse, and having their needs met. Following our history of how the Ebola and Zika outbreaks exacerbated existing gender inequalities and escalated gender-based violence, not much has ch...

Understanding geopolitical determinants of health https://www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/99/2/20-254904/en/

Humankind is on the move all the time, but in the past few decades this movement has become massive in different parts of the world. We are living in an era of unprecedented mobility of ideas, technology, money, and people. Globalization has changed the world and is continuing to change the relationships between nation-states, corporations, and int...

There is considerable evidence to suggest that individuals with mental illness as well as their carers and families are discriminated against across a number of domains. It is also well recognized that people with mental illness are likely to die younger than their counterparts who do not have mental illness. We propose that a Magna Carta is urgent...

The Compassion, Assertive action, Pragmatism and Evidence (CAPE) Vulnerability Index is a global foreign policy index which has been used to identify countries which require foreign aid and how that can be prioritized. The Index offers an evidenced, structured, and reasoned approach to using aid in bi-lateral agreements with mental health as a foun...

Editorial; Tribute Moving Beyond Christianity: Islam, Judaism, Hinduism and Mental Health Culturally Adapted Interventions in Mental Health: Global Position Statement Position Statement on Migration Mental Health A Magna Carta for People Living with Mental Illness Global Position statement Stigma, Mental Illness, Diversity

People have moved from one place to another within the same country or across national borders for millennia. The reasons for such movements have varied, as does the duration for which people migrate. With globalisation and global connections across countries, migration has increased. The process of migration and its impact on the mental health of...

It is often said that the true test of a decent society is the way it treats its most vulnerable citizens. However, across the world, too often, politicians, policy-makers, professionals and those with the authority and duty to protect and provide for them, fail to do so. In many countries people do not have access to basic mental health care and t...

The preponderance of western psychological concepts are often relied upon to conceptualise health-related phenomena. It is hardly surprising therefore that despite the availability of a number of interventions, studies have concluded that outcomes for minority cultural groups are not as good as for Caucasian people (western Europe and North America...

In the previous accompanying paper, we described geopolitical factors which affect mental health of individuals who suffer directly and indirectly. These disasters whether they are natural or man-made often attract significant amounts of aid and resources – financial and human. In addition, those who offer foreign aid need to be aware of where and...

Natural and man-made disasters carry with them major burden and very often the focus is on immediate survival and management of resulting infectious diseases. The impact of disasters directly and indirectly on the well-being and mental health of those affected often gets ignored. The reasons are often stigma and lack of attention to mental health c...

Religion as an adjunct in the treatment of mental illness is one of which the discipline of psychiatry must be very aware of and sensitive to. However, religion is not limited to worship of a particular deity but may incorporate other day-to-day factors. For patients, their family, faith leaders, and community interveners, determining whether the p...

Can we really dispel the stigma of mental illness without dispelling a number of other stigmas as well? How can we reduce feelings and experiences of stigma associated with mental illness on the one hand if there is stigma experienced by possessing another stigmatised identity, e.g. gender or race related, on the other hand? There have not been any...

Europe is struggling to cope with the large-scale influx of migrants making their way across the Mediterranean to Europe, the largest since the aftermath of World War II. It has sparked a crisis as countries struggle to cope with the influx. At the same time, it is creating divisions within the European Union (EU) over how best to resettle refugees...

What CAREIF proposes There is an urgent need to review the availability of culturally adapted interventions and available adaptation frameworks. Standardised guidelines including lists or catalogues of resources and some measures of effectiveness and acceptability for different adapted interventions are required. This would not only require a serie...

International Symposium: National And International Position Statements On Migrants, Refugees And Xenophobia Chair: Dinesh Bhugra & Wolfgang Gaebel Cultural Congruity and Settlements Dinesh Bhugra, (UK) President; World Psychiatric Association (WPA) The EPA Position Paper on Psychiatric Care of Refugees in Europe Wolfgang Gaebel, (Germany) Presi...

 The health case People living with mental illness have shorter lives and poor physical health compared to others. This is due to suicide, mental health problems worsening the course and interfering with appropriate care and self-management of physical health problems, and poorer treatment of those problems by the health care system.  The social...

The Centre for Applied Research and Evaluation –International Foundation (careif) & The World Association of Cultural Psychiatry (WACP): “cultural meaning of death, mental illness and compassion”. Padau: Italy September 2014; This international conference Seeing beyond in facing death is part of the initiatives related to the Master Death Studies...

Acts of violence against women questions whether inequality is embedded deep within societal and communities’ infrastructure These essays evoke a great deal of emotion, cultural sharing and resilience; http://careif.org/in-conversation-with-compassion-and-care/#more-358

There is no doubt that cultural differences and exchanges can require great humility and sensitivity to avoid unintended insult or humiliation; the human desire to befriend and reach out can sometimes result in disagreements about entitlements and mutual obligations and rights. http://careif.org/category/knowledge/commentary-and-analysis/

This is the second set of a series of essays examining the role of compassion and care through the lens of different professional and personal perspectives. These essays are a poignant reminder that true compassion is visceral and deep in its emotion. There is depth in the experiences shared in these essays; some intimate, some heart-breaking. Coll...

In Conversation with Compassion and Care. Recent events have questioned our humanity towards the most vulnerable in society; The reporting, discussions and increasingly the direction has revolved around Compassion and Care which bring into sharp focus the value base, characteristics and culture of individuals and the state. We – careif-asked and re...

Sports and arts based services for children have positive impacts on their mental and physical health. The charity sector provides such services, often set up in response to local communities expressing a need. The present study maps resilience promoting services provided by children's charities in England. Specifically, the prominence of sports an...

Concern has been expressed that it may be difficult to provide certain interventions to some ethnic groups in an Early Intervention Service for Psychosis, and that as a consequence, three-year outcomes for the different Ethnic Groups may be different in different groups. To test whether there are differences between the three year outcomes of diffe...

At least 95% of mental health problems are dealt with entirely in primary care. The other 5% are referred to secondary care, but these will be dealt with jointly by primary care services and secondary care services. Mental Health problems provide a major burden to primary care services, the doctors who operate in those services- the General Practit...

To describe the experiences of women suffering from postnatal depression in black and minority ethnic communities in Wiltshire, UK. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups with women across Wiltshire with current and past experience of postnatal depression. EPDS data are also reported. Qualitative data (via telephone and face-to-face interviews...

The introduction of the European Convention on Human Rights into UK law will have a direct effect on practice in mental health care. The authors discuss developments associated with the Convention, examine different articles and suggest the changes they could bring. They suggest that, rather than reacting to the development of convention rights, he...