Health care practitioners' perceptions of public mental health care in the Eastern Cape,South Africa |
| |
Authors: | Dalena van Rooyen Kegan Topper David Morton Joanitha Strümpher Isabell Schierenbeck Lena Andersson |
| |
Affiliation: | 1. Nelson Mandela Metropolitan UniversityDalena.VanRooyen@nmmu.ac.za;3. Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University;4. University of Gothenburg |
| |
Abstract: | This qualitative study explored the perceptions of health care practitioners (HCPs) concerning public mental health care in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. Data were collected from thirteen purposively selected HCPs using in-depth unstructured interviews (males?=?6, females?=?7). Data were transcribed verbatim and later thematically analysed. The findings suggest that mental health professionals perceive mental health services to be both inadequate and of suboptimal quality. Specifically, they perceived public mental health care to have lower priority, to be poorly resourced and lacking in patient-oriented care qualities. |
| |
Keywords: | health care practitioner mental health care mental illness low- and middle-income countries |
|