Building Mental Health Research Capacity in Kenya: a South-North Collaboration Abstract This paper describes a mental health capacity-building partnership between the University of Nairobi (UON) and the University of Washington (UW) that was built upon a foundational 30-year HIV/AIDS research training collaboration between the two institutions. With funding from the US National Institute of Mental Health Medical Education Program Initiative (MEPI), UW and UON faculty collaborated to develop and offer a series of workshops in research methods, grant writing, and manuscript publication for UON faculty and postgraduate students committed to mental health research. UON and UW scientists provided ongoing mentorship to UON trainees through Skype and email. Three active thematic research groups emerged that focused on maternal and child mental health, gender-based violence, and HIV-related substance abuse. Challenges to conducting mental health research in Kenya included limited resources to support research activities, heavy teaching responsibilities, clinical duties, and administrative demands on senior faculty, and stigmatization of mental health conditions, treatment, and research within Kenyan society. The partnership yielded a number of accomplishments: a body of published papers and presentations at national and international meetings on Kenyan mental health topics, the institution of systematic mental health data collection in rural clinics, funded research proposals, and a mental health research resource center. We highlight lessons learned for future mental health research capacity-building initiatives.

Introduction to the Issue on Equity, Collaboration, and Empowerment in Mental Health Research Partnerships

Advancing Research Practice Partnerships to Achieve Population - Level Mental Health Outcomes Abstract Maximizing the value of research on integrating mental health care within clinical and community settings globally requires attention to complexity, an integrated systems approach at multiple levels, and access to practice-based evidence that reflects care provided in a dynamic context. Although there has been increased emphasis on studying partnerships and understanding their role in improving the rigor and relevance of evidence in some research areas, cross-cutting work in this area remains limited. This article reflects on research-practice partnerships in three areas: dissemination and implementation research, community-based research, and health equity research. While progress has been made within these areas, each of these can contribute to the who, how, and what about mental health research to improve integration of mental health services within primary care and achieve population health outcomes.

Parenting Programs for Underserved Populations in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: Issues of Scientific Integrity and Social Justice Abstract Research suggests that parenting programs are effective for preventing behavioral and emotional difficulties in children, but a lot more attention needs to be paid to issues of context and culture during the development, testing, and implementation of these interventions. The views and needs of underserved and disenfranchised communities in the USA and the Global South are often not taken into account for the development and testing of interventions. The successful implementation of evidence-based interventions for vulnerable children and families in underserved and marginalized communities requires careful consideration of how existing paradigms of prevention, evaluation, and implementation science impact issues of social justice and equity. This paper will describe how a team of parenting program researchers has been collaborating with their partners globally in generating local knowledge by balancing the need for rigorous scientific methods with issues of power. Authors from the USA, Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia draw on their experiences regarding challenges and successes with issues regarding study design and measurement, the transferability and adaptation of interventions, and the dissemination and implementation of different parenting interventions while placing communities at the center of their efforts through participatory methods. We describe innovative approaches that span the continuum of intervention development, adaptation, optimization, evaluation, implementation, and scale-up of different parenting programs for vulnerable children and families across the world. We conclude by offering specific and pragmatic recommendations to increase access of culturally relevant and effective parenting programs in these communities.

Commentary: Equity and Exchange in Global Research-Practice Partnerships

Experiencing Health Services Research in the Global South: a Collaborative Autoethnography of Two Social Work Researchers Abstract Maternal health services research yields the potential to improve global health outcomes across countries. Many of the low-cost and effective clinical innovations to improve maternal mental health outcomes are implemented in the Global South. However, there remains a lack of collaboration from the Global South to the Global North. In this qualitative narrative, we use a collaborative autoethnographical approach to describe a doctoral training health services research experience between North America and South America. In this paper, we describe the ways power and privilege manifest in a South American research training program and our particular positionality as North American women of color. We will also describe the role of cultural humility and awareness of colonization as it translates to research training across the North and South. In conclusion, we will share lessons learned in forming skills to establish partnerships and where our maternal health collaboration aims to continue to build mutual collaboration across countries.

Global Social Welfare Academic Research Partnerships: Lessons Learned from Two Studies in Mongolia Abstract Literature on scientific and ethical issues concerning research in low- and middle-income countries has expanded greatly with globalization, highlighting the need to prioritize health and human rights over sociopolitical agendas in NGO-academic research partnerships. The purposes of this paper are to examine the development of a long-term partnership of social work and public health researchers in the U.S. and Mongolia and to describe two illustrative studies of mental health issues in Mongolia. The National Institutes of Health funded the first study, which tested the efficacy of an HIV prevention and microfinance intervention in Ulaanbaatar. In the second, the World Bank supported a needs assessment of social welfare programming across Mongolia. We then draw on principles of the Tropical Health and Education Trust (THET) model to highlight three themes that were central in both cases: (1) intentional, strategic negotiation of power, resources, and knowledge, balancing contributions from global North and South; (2) flexibility to permit adaptation to changing political, economic, and social contexts in the host setting; and (3) early and proactive building of local government and NGO/global donor support to implement and sustain programming. We conclude with suggestions and recommendations for global North-South partnerships based on our experience and lesson learned, reflecting on our successes and achievements and unresolved challenges.

Partnerships in a Global Mental Health Research Programme—the Example of PRIME Abstract Collaborative research partnerships are necessary to answer key questions in global mental health, to share expertise, access funding and influence policy. However, partnerships between low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) and high-income countries have often been inequitable with the provision of technical knowledge flowing unilaterally from high to lower income countries. We present the experience of the Programme for Improving Mental Health Care (PRIME), a LMIC-led partnership which provides research evidence for the development, implementation and scaling up of integrated district mental healthcare plans in Ethiopia, India, Nepal, South Africa and Uganda. We use Tuckman’s first four stages of forming, storming, norming and performing to reflect on the history, formation and challenges of the PRIME Consortium. We show how this resulted in successful partnerships in relation to management, research, research uptake and capacity building and reflect on the key lessons for future partnerships.

Correction to: Towards Household Asset Protection: Findings from an Inter-generational Asset Transfer Project in Rural Kenya The original version of this article unfortunately contained a mistake in the image of Fig. 1. Boxes of some texts in the said figure are missing. The corrected version of Fig. 1 is shown below.

Parents’ and Teachers’ Perceptions of Factors Affecting Learning in Kenya Abstract Introduction Studies have shown that a child’s learning in school is affected by several factors, some related to the school environment, others to the home and community while others are as a result of the individual characteristics of the child. This study sought to explore parents’ and teachers’ perceptions of factors that affect learning of children in primary schools in a rural County in Kenya. Methods This was a qualitative study that adopted the phenomenological approach. It was conducted with parents and teachers of 7 primary schools in rural and semi-rural areas of Kiambu County in Kenya. Using a researcher developed guide, data was collected using focus group discussion with parents and teachers. The discussions were conducted as follows: four were conducted in English language, two in Kiswahili language, and three were conducted in the local language and all were audio taped. Research assistants also took notes during the discussions. Results were transcribed verbatim and those that needed to be translated into English were translated. In analysis, MA, MM, and MT read the transcripts and coded the major themes. Results Four themes perceived by both parents and teachers to affect a child’s learning emerged. These were school environment, home, community, and factors within the child. Conclusion There is need for both teachers and parents to come together and discuss perceived factors that interfere with learning of the children. Those that form a consensus for both groups, means to address them be found for better academic success of the child.