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| Mental Health Problems Must Be Detected Early To Keep Them From Worsening. |
"Mental health is often not visible; thus, we need to be active to detect (problems),” acting head of the non-communicable disease, mental health, and substance abuse section of the office, Ngabila Salama, said at a World Mental Health Day commemoration event on Friday.
According to her, collaboration between various stakeholders is needed to raise awareness about the need for early detection of mental health problems, especially in terms of conducting creative and massive promotions.
“So, we have to campaign more often so that when people or children have mild disorders such as getting tired quickly, losing interest, feeling lazy to go to work, lazy to go to school, experiencing palpitations, finding it hard to sleep, these early symptoms can be diagnosed immediately; take them to the experts, treat them immediately," she expounded.
She said that to support early detection, the Jakarta Health Office has integrated the E-Soul and Mental Friend services with the JaKi (Jakarta Kini) application.
Adults can carry out screening using the E-Soul service, she informed. While using the service, people are required to answer questions honestly.
If the results of the screening show that they have mental health problems, they can consult clinical psychologists online through the Mental Friend service.
"Our clinical psychologists at community health centers are ready to help," Salama affirmed.
She informed that currently, there are 23 community health centers in subdistricts that are offering psychological services. She expressed the hope that in the future, all community health centers in Jakarta will offer the services.
"We are currently making a circular for strengthening so that 44 subdistricts have clinical psychologists," she added.
The Health Office is also developing an E-Soul service for children, she said.
Oleh : Suci Nurhaliza, Raka Adji/Antara
Editor : Yakop
