Speaking on Thursday at the formal launch of the facility,
the Commissioner for Health, Prof. Akin Abayomi said the Lagos Lifeline is a
mental health crisis management service designed to bridge the gap in the
availability of mental health service.
“The Lagos Lifeline provides a bridge to meet various
challenges militating against access to mental health services including, the
incidence of suicidal attempts, poor access to mental health services for
patients in hard-to-reach areas, stigma to mental health issues and patients
who need treatment, poor access to information and referral to neighbouring
health facilities providing mental health services and poor linkages for mental
health support for victims of domestic and sexual violence”, Abayomi stated.
He noted that the objective of the Lagos Lifeline is geared
towards providing improved access to simple diagnostic, counselling, and
referral services for Lagosians, either as first point-of-call, or for follow-up
care.
While stating that the Governor of Lagos State, Babajide
Sanwo-Olu has made mental health a priority, the Commissioner averred that this
is evident in government’s implementation activities targeted at increasing
access to mental health care at primary, secondary and tertiary levels of
health infrastructure.
Abayomi disclosed that the State Government has
conceptualized a Mental Health Institute with a capacity for 500 bed
psychiatric hospital and 1000 bed rehabilitation centre at Ketu Ejirin in
furtherance of its efforts to improve access to mental health services.
He said: “To make sure that we pick up mental health early,
we are refurbishing our psychiatric wards in our general hospitals and in our
tertiary hospital at LASUTH, and going beyond that, we have currently designed
and conceptualized probably the largest mental health institute in Nigeria; it
will be 500 bed psychiatric hospital coupled with 1000 bed for rehabilitation.
“It was originally scheduled to be built in Majidun but it
will be too big for Majidun, so we had to move it to Ketu-Ejirin where we have
a lot of space. It is going to be on 15 hectares of land, we are currently
reclaiming the lands.
“We have appointed the contractors, work will start this
year and it will become the focal point of our mental health strategy where we
will provide Lagosians with access to mental health services and train persons
who are skilled in recognizing and treating mental health”.
The Commissioner hinted that the state government will expend
resources to address mental health issues particularly as it affects emerging
issues of stress, anxiety, stigmatization and mental health disorders
associated with a mega city like Lagos.
While noting that mental health is one of the disciplines in
health that has been neglected, Abayomi averred that the present administration
is trying to make up for the neglect by investing in infrastructure and human
resource development to manage and address mental health issues.
“So while we plan to commemorate this year’s Mental Health
Awareness Month in May, we will keep going with a lot of energy. We will ensure
that we develop the human resources that are able to manage mental disorders,
more importantly create the opportunity to detect tell-tale science very early
and treat them before they become serious problems, and at the end, just making
life easier for Lagosians will go a long way to easing mental disorder, mental
stress and mental anxiety”, he said.
Earlier, the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Health, Dr.
Olusegun Ogboye, said the COVID-19 pandemic and its ensuing response including
the lockdown strategy brought to fore some health issues that are linked to
mental health prompting the need for improved access to mental health services
He said: “The Ministry of Health recognized early that there
is a reason to strengthen our mental health program and our mental health
response and this is what led to the set up of the Lagos Lifeline. We have a
team of dedicated staff led by Dr Ajomale who has been extremely committed to
this process to help set up the help line”.
Explaining how the Lifeline works, Ogboye said “we have
people who have been trained in responding to callers. People call in and speak
with one of our trained Lifeline counselors who find out what the challenges
are and provide help as required.
“Sometimes the Lifeline contact ends with that single
conversation and sometimes it requires further engagement. The Lifeline
counselors are volunteers and they sometimes reach back to people or take calls
back again from people. There is a back and front that resolves issues and
sometimes we refer specific mental health issues to mental professionals for
further engagement and management”.
The Permanent Secretary stated that the Lifeline is a 24
hours service that has linkage to a much bigger programme and services for
mental health in Lagos state.
Also speaking, the Head Special Projects and State Mental
Health Desk Officer, Dr. Tolu Ajomale explained that the goals of the Lifeline
are to: provide Psychological First Aid and Social Support service, alleviate
the strain on existing public health resources by creating a coordination point
to refer patients for appropriate care and serve as a Mental Health campaign
Feedback system.
Other goals according to him are to: create valuable data
points that can be used to track prevalence and cycle of care for Mental Health
in Lagos State, access to mental health services for patients in hard-to-reach
areas, improve linkages for victims of Domestic and Sexual Violence and
Suicidal Threats and Emergency Medical Services.
“The Lifeline will also provide the opportunity to improve
training and access to skill development in Mental Health for Staff,
Volunteers, and Interns; create a partnership Hub for Multinationals, Corporate
Organizations and NGOs with interests in Mental Health; evaluate the acceptance
of Telehealth in wider Healthcare Space and serve as an advocacy Hub to improve
uptake of State health programs including Health Insurance and information
dissemination during epidemics.
“The service will be running 24hrs, it has multiple access
points, you can also book appointments via email to speak with a counselor and
we also have good networks with private providers as well.
“We have different kinds of calls that will be coming in
over the couple of weeks because we have been testing the service; we have
people with mood disorder, suicidal ideations, substance abuse. Parents have
called on behalf of their children as well to ask and speak about some of these
issues and to seek help regarding them. So we are much honoured to launch this
service and to increase the scope of its delivery”, Ajomale said.