![Behavioral Intervention Can Reduce Psychological Distress In Women: WHO Behavioral Intervention Can Reduce Psychological Distress In Women: WHO](https://images.medindia.net/health-images/1200_1000/psychological-distress.jpg)
‘Problem Management Plus (PM+) developed by World Health Organization is as a brief 5-session intervention that helps treat people experiencing psychological distress.’
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In a study published in PLOS Medicine, Richard A. Bryant of the University of New South Wales, Australia, and colleagues tested the five-session intervention on 421 women in Kenya.The World Health Organization has developed Problem Management Plus (PM+) as a brief 5-session intervention to treat people experiencing psychological distress following adversity. Because lay community health workers can be trained to deliver PM+, it is particularly applicable in resource-limited settings.
This study, in a peri-urban area of Nairobi, Kenya, randomly assigned 421 women who displayed distress and impaired functioning to receive either 5 individual sessions of PM+ or enhanced usual care (EUC).
The primary outcome was psychological distress as measured by total score on the 12-item General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12) assessed at 3 months after treatment.
Assessments by investigators who were blind to the treatment assignment indicated that women who received PM+ reported significantly less psychological distress, with a moderate effect relative to EUC.
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Further study is needed to evaluate the sustainability of PM+ in the community so that survivors of gender-based violence can be safely identified and treated without stigma.
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In an accompanying Perspective, Alexander C. Tsai of Harvard Medical School, USA, says: "The potential widespread deployment of PM+ stands at the intersection of two vital issues relevant to women's health: mental health and interpersonal violence. Until the large-scale structural forces that give rise to health disparities affecting vulnerable populations can be eliminated. The health system will continue to play a key role in the multisectoral response to violence against women in resource-limited settings."
Source-Eurekalert