Dixon Chabanda: How Can A Team Of Grandmothers Make Therapy Accessible To All?
Part 3 of the TED Radio Hour episode Erasing The Stigma.
About Dixon Chibanda's TED Talk
In Zimbabwe, like many countries, there are few options for mental health care. So psychiatrist Dixon Chibanda came up with an unexpected solution: therapy from trained grandmothers, on park benches.
About Dixon Chibanda
Dixon Chibanda is an associate professor at the University of Zimbabwe and the director of the African Mental Health Research Initiative (AMARI).
He created the Friendship Bench program in Zimbabwe, which is a cognitive therapy-based approach to depression. The program trains community grandmothers in evidence-based talk therapy and attentive listening as an accessible alternative to mental illness care. The Friendship Bench has now spread to several other countries, including the United States.
Dixon holds a MA in Public Health from the University of Zimbabwe and a PhD from the University of Cape Town. [Copyright 2019 NPR]
