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Jan 19, 2016 News
It is only January 19 and Guyana has already witnessed a rash of suicides, six attempted suicides, ten murders along with ten attempted murders. Some may say that our country has entered the leap year under a dark cloud.
Personal Achievement to Overcome Individual Struggles (PATOIS) is a non-profit, non-governmental organisation (NGO) that has been providing mental health services in Guyana since 2011.
The Head of this Institute is Ingrid Goodman, a psycho- therapist who is a born Guyanese, but has studied in Grenada. She is a professional mental health practitioner who has 25 years of practice studying mental issues. She has a solid method of tackling this social scourge afflicting communities across Guyana.
She currently runs an establishment known as “Women’s Refuge” which is located in Section ‘C’ Enterprise, East Coast Demerara (ECD) that promotes a youth self-esteem group therapy through a variety of programmes. This institution is currently funded by the Australian Aid.
Suicide and murder has scourged this land and her institution believes in ‘reunification’, a process that must be undertaken to tackle the various social illnesses that impact societal factors.
Goodman has a Master’s Degree in Social Work, a first Degree in Business Administration and has been in the mental health scene since 1992. She has also studied Applied Behavioural Analysis at both normal and Post Graduate Levels.
The psycho- therapist has lived in five other countries — Grenada, the United Kingdom, Botswana, Zimbabwe and the United States of America.
Also, in light of First Lady Sandra Granger’s address on suicide and mental health issues last Friday at the Pegasus Hotel, PATOIS has also taken up that mantel on a different scale.
The Institution has accumulated valuable data spanning over a period of five years that displays various ethnic groups, ages, genders and other societal problems. This data indicates that Indo-Guyanese comprise a massive 65% of the Guyanese population that commit suicide and other requisite acts.
She returned to Guyana back in 2009 and recognizing the dreaded mental state of persons within the community, she made the solemn decision to tackle mental issues within various communities.
Women’s Refuge offers a number of empowerment programmes to equip individuals with the knowledge to educate others on this problem, which is a prominent social issue.
In a discussion with this publication, she said that individuals who commit these heinous acts have had mental issues that have been affecting them since childhood days. Goodman said that “most people do not understand that issues such as suicide and murder have deeper (origins) in our society”.
“There is no quick-fix, there is no just-so answer,” she said. “They did not get to that state overnight and it will not be fixed overnight. I strongly believe in reunification, it is a process in which the problem must firstly be identified and isolated then treated appropriately.”
She is the fore-runner for many campaigns on empowerment sessions across various communities in Guyana. These sessions are targeted especially to women, knowing that most men would not be interested.
The World Health Organization (WHO) says that Guyana has a suicide rate four times the global average, ahead of North Korea, South Korea, and Sri Lanka.
Also In 2014, Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the WHO reported that more than 800,000 people die from suicide every year. It also said that Guyana has the world’s highest estimated suicide rate as of 2012.
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