SOUTH AFRICAN RESEARCHERS ARE NOW developing an innovative, validated online tool to help people recognize and seek treatment for depression and mental health issues. PhD candidate Tasneem Hassem of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, along with co-founder Professor Sumaya Laher, have been awarded almost $7,000 in seed funding to further develop and commercialize the tool, aimed at allowing users to more easily recognize and obtain treatment for depression, particularly within the South African context, where low mental health awareness and access to mental health services can still be a challenge.



 “Unfortunately, low awareness of the symptoms of depression means that many people do not know when they are depressed. During our research and through interviews with stakeholders, we determined that an online screening tool would help raise awareness of depression, reduce the stigma and facilitate quality conversations between people and health professionals” says Hassem to FORBES AFRICA. 



According to a recent report in The Lancet which assessed the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on mental health in 204 countries, anxiety and depressive disorders increased by some 25% across the countries sampled, with South Africa seeing one of the highest rates of increase worldwide.



 “The emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic has created an environment where many determinants of poor mental health are exacerbated,” the study continued. 



This is confirmed in the South African context by the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG), a mental health services and advocacy organization. 



“We know that the mental health impact during Covid has been immense – we’ve seen that at SADAG,” says Cassey Chambers, SADAG’s operations coordinator, to FORBES AFRICA. 



“Just from January this year, we received over 466,000 calls to our helplines. One in every five calls is a suicide-related issue. And that’s still a conservative figure. Our call volumes from pre-Covid [to this year] has increased by 160%. Covid has definitely impacted mental health, it’s definitely added to more depression, more anxiety, added to people’s mental health issues… Covid has definitely increased the mental health impact.” 



Ensuring mental health tools are relevant to the context and location in which they will be used is a crucial part of ethical and successful interventions, which was a criticalfocus of Hassem’s research and piloting of the app, with the guidance of healthcare professionals. 



The tool’s development funding comes through the University of the Witwatersrand’s Prospector course which aims to foster and develop promising entrepreneurial ideas in research – with Hassem’s proposal securing funding over seven other proposals, with the project being of possibly high value in South Africa, where mental health resources are extremely limited, with some four mental health spaces per 100,000 members of the population, and just 0.97 psychologists for the same number. 



“What is exciting in this instance is that the tool developed by Ms Hassem and Prof Laher has significant potential to support our communities in an illness that is prevalent, yet difficult to diagnose and treat not least because of the unfortunate stigma associated with it. Innovation must meet the real needs of our citizens, and it’s not just about profits,” comments Ela Romanowska, Director of Innovation Support at Wits Enterprise, which supports the initiative. 



“Our tool is specifically adapted to capture the unique depression symptoms experienced by South African individuals. The user receives instant, downloadable feedback that provides resources for seeking treatment or care and can be used in the comfort of one’s home, on any smartphone, tablet, laptop or computer,” explains Hassem.

Directly above shot of mother embracing depressed son on bed at home

Financing Mental Health: NEW TECH TOOL TO TREAT DEPRESSION

As Covid-19 continues to spread ruthlessly across the globe, governments have enforced lockdowns in countries to slow the infection rate. And this has meant restricted movements of people and work from home. As the globe’s population practises self-isolation and social-distancing, the lack of the familiar can lead to further stress and mental health issues. Establishing coping mechanisms to deal with anxiety and depression during these times is crucial. Healthcare practitioner and counselling psychologist, Nkateko Ndala-Magoro, through the South African Depression and Anxiety Group’s Facebook platform, lets us in on five self-help strategies to deal with depression.



Get active: “It is hard I know to stay active while you are confined. The benefits of staying active is the release of feel good hormones that are in contrast with the hormones that exacerbate depression. Being active also helps regulate your heart beat; for people suffering from anxiety, the regulation of breathing might help with the severity of the anxiety/panic attack.”



Take time to sleep: “I know people are already feeling like they do not have any more positions of sleep because of sleeping too much during lockdown. I encourage that people get as much quality sleep as possible in this time. Sleeping has benefits on our health and wellbeing in general, let alone on our mental health on many levels.”



Read: “Keep yourself busy by reading. There is a wealth of information in books. There are many online platforms including Amazon, which have made available e-books for free. Read self-help books and fiction to escape the reality; and any other books that interest you.”



Learn a new skill: “This will also keep you interested as mastering something new takes a lot in terms of focus and energy.”



Connect with loved ones: “Connect with your loved ones via video chats. Journal and work on things you have been meaning to work on to give you a sense of accomplishment.”

Man self isolating at home

5 Ways To Cope With The Self During Isolation

One in four South African employees are diagnosed with
depression annually. There are ways you can seek help while your identity is
protected by law.



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



You find your life spiralling out of control. There is an
overwhelming feeling of helplessness and the things that used to interest you
do not anymore. If this is what you are going through, you are not alone.



In South Africa, 4.5 million people suffer from depression,
costing the country $16.6 billion of its Gross Domestic Product due to lost
productivity, either due to absence from work or not attending work citing
sickness. 



These are figures by the IDEA study of the London School of
Economics and Political Science in 2016.



According to the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG), depression is among the prevalent mental disorders in South Africa, resulting in one-in-four South African employees diagnosed with depression annually. 



Meet Mfuneko Mthi, a prison warden from Kokstad, a little
town nestled between South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape provinces.
Today, he sounds upbeat and has a positive outlook on life but this was not the
case two years ago. 



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He suffered from depression. It all started when he and his
childhood friend were shot at by a gang leader in their community. 



Mthi escaped death but the trauma manifested as depression. 



The two years took a toll on his personal and professional
life.&nbsp;&nbsp; 



As a prison warden, he had to work closely with prisoners
and at times, their correctional services uniforms would bring back painful
flashbacks of his offender. 



From then, it progressed to the perpetual submission of
medical certificates, one after the other, as he desperately tried all means to
run away from his inner demons.&nbsp; 



“I started reporting sick from work on a regular basis, even
though I was not sick. I could not face the correctional services uniform after
I had seen my offender, during the victim-offender dialogue (VOD),” Mthi
says.&nbsp; 



“The VOD is a voluntary process, where the offender and
victim are able to talk about the effects of the crime. Through the VOD
program, victims of crimes… engage with offenders and communities so that
relationships can be restored and forgiveness sought,” states a report by the
Department of Correctional Services.



During the times that Mthi was present at work, leaving
early also became a regular practice and isolation was his best-kept secret to
maintain sanity, he says. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">I would leave early to go to my place and consume alcohol. I used up all my leave and sick days at work just to avoid being around people.</blockquote>



Mthi needed to go back to the root of the problem in order
to get the help he needed. 



He details how he and his friend were attacked by the same
perpetrator on two separate occasions.



“When I was in my teens, a gang leader who was feared in our
community, used to recruit the youth to commit crimes. When my friend and I
refused, he assaulted us. It is then that our parents opened a case of common
assault with the police,” Mthi says.



The unexpected happened. 



“On the day we got back from his bail hearing, he shot my
friend and I, saying that nobody presses criminal charges against him.”&nbsp; 



Mthi suffered multiple gun-shot wounds but his friend did
not survive the onslaught.



&nbsp;As the wounds healed,
the internal scars continued to bleed; life’s problems rubbed salt into Mthi’s
wounds. 



“A friend of mine committed suicide in 2017 and till this
day, we do not know what led to him doing that. 



“But he did make us aware that he was experiencing a series
of problems, and his job as a prison warden was taking a toll on him due to the
number of traumatizing things that happen in prison,” Mthi says.



&nbsp;He would drown his
sorrows in alcohol when the waves of depression were unrelenting. 



“I would drink a lot to help me sleep most of the time. Even
though I would go out sometimes, I got to a point where I was overdoing it and
that led to me being broke and that created a cycle which would lead to more
depression.”&nbsp; 



Mthi realized he had a problem and he took the first step
towards healing. 



He called SADAG, an organization in South Africa at the
forefront of patient advocacy and educating society on mental illness.



&nbsp;“They told me that I
had depression symptoms and advised that I go see a nearby clinical
psychiatrist,” Mthi says. 



According to Charity Mkone, a clinical psychologist, the
societal stigma associated with depression makes it difficult for it to be
warranted an illness.&nbsp; 



“It is something that is not seen as a real illness…people think that it is something that you can control and that you choose whether to be depressed or not. They also think that because of certain circumstances – such as being a prominent figure – you do not have a right to be depressed,” she says.&nbsp; 



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However, that is not true. Most people, according to Mkone,
have had some form of depression in their life, where they present SIGMECAPS
symptoms (as defined in the box-out).



&nbsp;“To some degree, we
have all expressed these feelings at a point in our lives. But it is usually a
phase. But for someone struggling with depression; that becomes a dominant way
of feeling, as opposed to someone who is feeling like that because of the
circumstances, and once the problem has disappeared, they are fine. A depressed
person would still feel depressed,” she says.



&nbsp;According to SADAG, rural-based
studies have found a prevalent rate of 18% depressive symptomatology and 27%
rate of depression, as opposed to the urban settings where as much as 25.2% of
the population is depressed and in peri-urban settlements where 34.7% of the
people have postpartum depression.



&nbsp;There are 23 known
suicides in South Africa per day, making it approximately 8,000 suicides each
year. Based on research from SADAG, for every person who commits suicide, 10
have attempted it. 



In South Africa, even though women are two times more likely
to suffer from depression, men are more prone to committing suicide. This is
often because men in South Africa battle to come forward with mental health
problems due to the stigma attached to mental health.



“It has a lot more to do with the stigma and that men don’t
actually come out to say that they are depressed. It makes them feel that they
are weak people because one of the symptoms of depression is deep overwhelming
sadness,” Mkone says.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">Men are five times more likely to be successful at suicide then women<cite> Charity Mkone </cite></blockquote>







Suicidal thoughts normally manifest when depression goes
untreated for a long time. 



Mkone says that when men commit suicide, they are found to
do it in a more lethal manner.



&nbsp; One of the first
steps that could be used within communities in order to assist people suffering
from depression is to be more aware of the symptoms. 



The more measures are taken to educate people in the
workplace and in communities concerning depression, Mkone believes this would
alleviate the number of suicidal deaths because persons suffering from
depression would get the help they need at an early stage.



&nbsp;It is, however,
important to note that depression may be caused by a number of problems such as
external factors, genetic inheritance, an imbalance of brain chemicals, certain
medical conditions, substance abuse as well as other various medical
conditions. 



This is why mental illness is a treatable condition and, as
a result, 80% to 90% of people have had a good response to medical care. 



Depression in the work place



Depression in the work place is becoming more visible.



“According to the medical ethical code of conduct that all
clinical psychologists sign and are bound to, the sessions that you have with
the client are strictly confidential unless the client gives you written
consent to divulge information about their sessions,” says Mkone. 



“In terms of a patient requiring a written letter for work,
we can provide a medical certificate,” she says. 



One in six employees are willing to disclose their mental
illness, according to a 2017 survey by SADAG.



Nadine Mather, who is a senior associate at law firm,
Bowmans, says: “An employee is not obliged to disclose to their employer that
they suffer from depression or any other mental condition. An employee may,
however, voluntarily choose to do so.”



&nbsp; She added that
should there be a case where the employer is aware that the employee suffers
from depression and it affects their performance at work, then they may address
the matter following the correct procedures, and it would be illegal if they
dismiss the employee without that. 



Depression is regarded as a sub-category of “incapacity” and is recognized as a fair reason to terminate an employee’s employment under the South African law should they no longer be fit to perform their duties.



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“In this regard, our law places an obligation on employers
to investigate the cause, degree and effect of the employee’s depression or
mental condition thoroughly, in order to ascertain the impact that it might have
on the employee’s work,” says Mather.



If the employer can prove without reasonable doubt that the
business or company cannot function without the duties of the employee within a
certain time period, then that could result in the termination of their duties.




“Only when an employer has followed a fair process and can
show that there is no prospect of an employee recovering sufficiently to
justify their continued employment, or improving within a time period during
which an employer could cope without suffering significant loss as a result of
an employee’s absence, would termination of the employee’s employment for
depression or a mental condition become justifiable,” Mather says.



“On the other hand, where the employee is too ill to work
and the employer fails to follow a fair process, the employee may, in certain
circumstances, be awarded compensation up to a maximum of 12 month’s
remuneration,” she says. 



When an employer realizes that their employee is suffering
from depression, they are obligated to support them. 



In Mthi’s case, the employers were supportive. 



They tried to accommodate him by removing him from
traumatizing environments that made him feel uncomfortable.



Mthi is no longer on medication for his depression, but
along the way, he has found the positive aspects of life.&nbsp; 



“I go to the gym during my spare time and I also sell
t-shirts. With the money I make from selling them, I assist the less fortunate
in my community, by buying them school uniforms,” Mthi says.



He is also working with some of his colleagues to build
houses in his community. 



Proving that Mthi is no longer the bleak and lost man he was
two years ago, he initiated a Facebook page last year called Depression is
Real. 



The page provides a platform to those who would like to talk
about depression. 



As depression is on the rise in the country, so are those
that have won the war over the illness, like Mthi. 



The trick is to seek help – before it’s too late.&nbsp;

Really bad news about my home finances. Debica, Poland

Depression in the work place

It was an experience easier to drown in than describe – one of Romi Vidmar’s many hypnotherapy sessions in his small office in Northcliff, an affluent suburb in Johannesburg, South Africa.
As we meet, cars drive past on the busy road. Vidmar asks if I want to experience hypnotherapy.
I sit up straight on the black office chair, my hands on the brown armrest, and Vidmar makes suggestions in a calm voice.
“Visualize your wrist on the right arm. Feel it, imagine it and nod your head when you can. Imagine everything I say is happening because it would actually happen,” he says.
He makes some more suggestions and everything he says happens, until I am in a hypnotic state.
As he speaks, there is a sense of calm, vaguely familiar, akin to the countless times I found myself lost in thought, absorbed in a zone, or simply, daydreaming. The session lasts less than 10 minutes but has the effect of two hours of sleep.
“You are of supreme confidence,” he says as he closes the session.
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Even though I had started the session as a sceptic, I feel more relaxed than I have ever been. As I pen this article, I still remember his soothing instructions. Twenty one days later, I feel more confident and have a brighter outlook on life.
“With hypnosis, the human mind goes into an even more relaxed state than meditation. The physical body becomes completely relaxed but the mind remains active,” says Vidmar, a software programmer who has always been interested in understanding how things work. The human mind is one of his major interests.
“I was very interested in hypnotherapy and started doing some research. It wasn’t easy because there wasn’t enough information and most of what was there was confused with entertainment and spiritualism but I discovered, through reading academic work, there is a solid basis for the hypnotic state which you just experienced now,” he says.
<div id="attachment_34398" style="width: 511px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34398" class=" wp-image-34398" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Romi-Vidmar-e1510734243740-300x199.jpg" alt="Romi Vidmar hypnotherapy" width="501" height="332" />Romi Vidmar (Photo supplied)</div>
In 2000, Vidmar trained to be a hypnotherapist and started practising.
“With hypnotherapy, I am able to understand the human mind and help people suffering from depression, anxiety, wanting to lose weight, stop smoking, gain confidence and many other things. For example, with people who have been abused, we help them not to forget but bring some degree of comfort so that they can be able to continue with their lives,” he says.
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According to Vidmar, hypnotherapy is witnessing a big boom in town. He sees eight patients a day at R800 ($60) for a one-hour session. Most of his clients, he says, just want to be happier, deal with depression and other mental issues, stop smoking or lose weight.
“Prescribing medication may be a lot quicker but the medical industry should explore hypnotherapy as a much more sustainable solution. Eighty to 90 percent of my clients see a change after the first session and they come back five or 10 years later but in that time they refer other people.”
Amanda Hoole (name changed to protect identity) is one of the many who claim hypnotherapy helped.
“I had many issues because I was abused as a child and I had a bit of a rebellious energy. I smoked a lot and was an alcoholic. Over the years, I have had hypnotherapy about six times. Now alcohol and cigarettes smell and I can’t stand them. I am even able to keep a job, which is something I couldn’t do for many years,” she affirms.
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According to Vidmar, this effect is possible because hypnotherapy also comes with suggestibility, so much that it was used instead of anaesthesia more than 200 years ago.
“Some medical doctors even train so they can use hypnotherapy when treating patients, for example if a child is afraid of the needle or for women going through childbirth.”
He says hypnotherapy helps by interacting with the subconscious to address the whole mind rather than just treating the symptoms. Through the words used in the session, Vidmar says hypnotherapy replaces trauma with positivity and suggestions create long-term improvement.
“You are even able to deal with unresolved feelings. With hypnotherapy, we can go down to the deepest level of these traumatic experiences, memories and stored emotions to release them from the mind and body,” says Vidmar.
In fast-moving 21st century Africa, hypnotherapy may hold the answer to mental wellbeing, or could at least be one of the options to relieve trauma and stress.

Is Hypnotherapy The Answer?

‘Too Many Suffer In Silence’ – The Sad Story Of Mental Illness

Depression and anxiety are highly stigmatized in the boardroom and top executives have become masters at keeping it locked down, going to extreme lengths to hide such problems.
In the fast-paced corporate world, if you are falling apart, you dare not show it. But is that a good thing?
Recent research has shown many successful women are victims of stress as they strive to balance work and family. But even as children and careers collide, women need to prioritize their wellbeing.
Take 40-year-old successful corporate woman and mother of two, Nicci (surname withheld for confidentiality), who says she experienced “a ridiculously heightened sense of anxiety” possibly linked to post-natal depression after the birth of her first child.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-6303" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_178716563-300x214.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="214" />
“I was 36, I was trying to run a business, a home and look after my baby. I remember feeling isolated, alone and incompetent, and being an established business woman, that was a terrible feeling,” she says, echoing the thoughts of many like her.
“I have learned there is no such thing as the perfect balance between a career and motherhood. This is a myth propagated by the media and there is no way women are achieving this holy grail. There are times when you have more time for your career, then something happens and bang, you have to pay more attention to your family. It’s also important to note that a man who has a successful wife often simply assumes he will also have the perfect wife and mother and it is our complicity in this which adds to the pressure. We, as women, try and do it all,” says Nicci.
Dr Colinda Linde, Chair of the Advisory Board at the South African Depression and Anxiety Group (SADAG), and a practicing clinical psychologist, feels modern working women have no role models when it comes to managing the demands of a career and family life.
“Even if our mothers worked, few had careers which resembled those of today and the demands of parenting have also changed, with children’s schedules often as busy as those of their parents. In a dual income household, it mainly still falls to the woman to run the home. This leads to feeling divided and not really being present in the moment – when you are at a school event, your phone is still beeping and when you are at work, your home or issues with your children may also be on your mind,” says Linde.
Over time, this leads to stress and burnout. She says while women learn to rely on other women such as housekeepers or mothers to help with child-rearing, they tend not to expect their partners to take on domestic responsibilities.
“There is a trend emerging where men are doing more to help in the home than their fathers did, by a significant amount, but it is still a relatively small part compared to the typical female portfolio of duties,” says Linde.
&nbsp;
Falling Off The Cliff
Richard Hawkey from Equilibrium Solutions, who has worked with Linde and has conducted substantial research, reveals findings where anxiety, depression or burnout, while highly stigmatized as a sign of weakness, are more than common, with women more affected than men.
Hawkey, who calls himself ‘the recovering banker’, says he slipped into severe clinical depression in 2010 after 15 years in a top position in the finance sector.
“As a senior manager, I had no idea how damaging stress was, or that if you are a Type-A personality (achiever, driver, controller), there isn’t necessarily a slow decline to warn you the cliff is approaching – you simply fall off the end one day. I was happily married, with great children and a house in the suburbs, along with all the trappings of success, so how could I have a breakdown and become depressed?”
Since then, he has recovered and is finishing a Master’s degree in Applied Psychology, and also set up his company Equilibrium Solutions, which in partnership with several doctors, has designed Vitals Software, a confidential online stress self-awareness and management tool.
He gathered and analyzed data from 2,500 respondents surveyed via this online resource. Most were white-collar workers, 98% from South Africa.
Hawkey says key findings, such as 37% complaining of unexplained chest pains were “worryingly high”, as was the 50% of respondents ‘living for Fridays’, highlighting high levels of apathy
and demotivation.
He adds women consistently scored higher than men in the manifestation of various symptoms.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-6305" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/shutterstock_172980497-300x262.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="262" />
Hawkey says the situation may well be worse than indicated by the findings, as anecdotal evidence reveals executives are self-medicating, won’t use Employee Assistance Programs and will take two weeks of leave pretending they are ‘going on holiday’, but in fact are booking into a psychiatric unit.
“This anecdotal evidence is quite terrifying. Executives will pay for such treatment with cash and will not use their medical aid in order to keep the problem hidden,” he says.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 350 million people across the globe suffer from depression, with less than half receiving treatment due to a number of barriers, a prime one being the social stigma attached to mental disorders.
&nbsp;
More Pressure For The Top Brass
While women trying to balance a career and family are expected not to show any weakness, Hawkey adds that women in the upper echelons of management are particularly under pressure, as they have to appear tough and if from a historically-disadvantaged background, have to prove themselves beyond tokenism, while at the same time shoulder the burden of family.
“My advice to women who are feeling overwhelmed is to speak to someone you trust. It’s important to know you are not alone,” he says.

Tag: Depression

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