Thanks to the success of the community-based depression care pilot program in Thai Nguyen, despite major disruptions due to the COVID pandemic, BasicNeeds Vietnam continues to be trusted by the Johnson and Johnson Foundation, which continues to provide funding to expand the project in Thai Nguyen and Ninh Binh provinces. Notable project outcomes:

Regarding building system capacity:

– Training and capacity building for mental health hospital staff in Thai Nguyen and Ninh Binh provinces. Dozens of doctors and nurses have become instructors and technical supervisors for grassroots health workers in implementing measures for community-based depression management, including early detection screening and behavioral activation therapy.

– Trained hundreds of grassroots health workers from local health stations, who would successfully implement depression management measures for their local communities

Regarding service provision, BasicNeeds successfully implemented the project in 20 communes & wards in Thai Nguyen Province and 31 communes & wards in Ninh Binh province, bringing community-based depression management services to 16,672 people at high risk of depression, and successfully organizing 102 psychological therapy groups for more than 2,045 people with depression in the community.

Regarding scientific development, BasicNeeds contributed evidence to policy change advocacy efforts. The project provided research documents and data for mental health experts to study and evaluate the effectiveness of community-based mental health care models and depression management, primarily based on simple psychological interventions developed by BasicNeeds Vietnam. Expert at Hanoi Medical University have successfully supervised a ground-breaking doctoral thesis that has resulted in the publication of numerous high-quality scientific articles in prestigious domestic and international academic journals.

Regarding enhancing sustainability and resilience:

– Ninh Binh provincial leaders have appraised the project’s success and allocated budget to comprehensively evaluate a five-year project implementation process, moving towards developing a plan to continue implementing the model transferred by BasicNeeds Vietnam to the Ninh Binh health sector.

– BasicNeeds Vietnam has collaborated with Hanoi Medical University to standardize and approve the materials developed and implemented by BasicNeeds Vietnam, ensuring they meet the official quality standards of Hanoi Medical University. These materials have been recognized as a Continuing Medical Education (CME) program within the curriculum of Hanoi Medical University.