Marriage, ill health makes you poorer

(IRIN) – Uncertain harvests are a perennial risk for rural Afghans, but two events stand out as exacerbating poverty – ill health, and the high cost of getting married, according to a new report.

CLICK ON LINK BELOW FOR FULL REPORT
Http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?ReportID=91254

New free health clinic for refugees and asylum seekers

Immigration cap leaves Hospitals Trusts in a lurch

Immigration cap has left Hospitals Trusts unable to hire staff. At least one of the trusts has decided to move the UK Border Agency on the issue.

As many as 100 foreign nurses with job offers from North West London Hospitals Trust have been left in a limbo due to the immigration cap announced last month.

As of now, the trust cannot issue them with a certificate. This is because the number of “certificates of sponsorship” employers is allowed to issue to foreign staff needing UK residency has been cut by 5 per cent.

The trust is now appealing against the restriction with the UK Border Agency. A decision in this regard is expected by October.

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Report writing for doctors

Report writing for doctors supplying evidence on asylum applications – training, 24 September, Coventry Refugee Centre

GPs with asylum seeker patients are asked to write medical reports for asylum cases, and are often well placed through their knowledge of their patient to provide evidence and information. However, writing full, “expert” medico-legal reports requires training and experience. A network of GPs writing medico-legal reports on asylum applicants was set up in 2008 to provide training and support for GPs. Ongoing training and accreditation in medical report writing should strengthen the role of GPs and the effectiveness of their reports at the Home Office.

Sponsored by the Department of Health, the 4th GP Medical Report Training Day will provide both new and experienced GP report writers with presentations from legal and medical experts, and with a forum for GPs to present their own reports. UKBA staff will explain the role and importance of medical reports in decision-making. Expert legal advisors will present on legal aspects, and medical presenters on recognising and documenting the physical and psychological evidence of trauma/torture. There will be a session on how to structure and present expert reports.

Attendance is free. Certificates of attendance will be provided.

Anyone interested in attending should send their name and contact details to Dr Alison Callaway to book a place:

Dr Alison Callaway (Lead GP)

The Meridian, 15 Bishop Street, Coventry CV1 1HU T: 02476-223921 F: 02476-223923

Children doing time with their mothers

(IRIN) – Sarah Moyo, 24 – not her real name – clasps her stunted one-year-old child to her chest as she talks to her visiting husband through a chain-link fence at the Central Remand Prison, on the eastern fringe of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare.

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Mental Health of Refugees and Asylum Seekers

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Thoughout the world the number of refugees and asylum seekers continues to increase at an astonishing rate. Given that most will have left their country due to persecution, war, or appalling violations of their human rights, many will have specific mental health needs. Cultural and socioeconomic factors play a major role in expressions of distress, help seeking, pathways into care, and acceptance or rejection of treatments.

Being a refugee or asylum seeker raises questions about an individual’s self respect and altered identity. Too often though, the needs of this population are ignored by policy makers and clinicians, and these people are left to fend for themselves. Mental Health of Refugees and Asylum Seekers presents both the theoretical and practical aspects of the mental health needs of refugees and asylum seekers. It looks at the impact of migration on mental health and adjustment, collective trauma, individual identity, and diagnostic fallacies. A practical section highlights cultural factors, ethnopsychopharmacology, therapeutic interaction, therapeutic expectation and psychotherapy.

The final part of the book focuses on special problems – such as bereavement, sexual violence, and post traumatic stress disorders, as well as considering mental health problems in special groups, such as child refugees. This book will be an essential resource for all mental health professionals- helping them better understand the needs of refugees and asylum seekers, how their problems can be managed, and how they can best be helped.

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Family Planning Association (FPA) training

This one-day course aims to increase participants’ awareness of asylum seekers’ and refugees’ sexual health information needs and is aimed at anyone who works with asylum seekers.

Those attending the course will:

All participants on this course will receive a free copy of Sexual health, asylum seekers and refugees: a handbook for people working with refugees and asylum seekers in England (FPA).

The training will take place on 28 September 2010 in London at a cost of £120. Anyone interested in the training should Fill in a training booking form, call Helen Shipley on 0845 122 8661 or email helens@fpa.org.uk.

Asylum health project expands provision

By Melanie Singhji

The free healthcare advocacy programme, Project: London, is to open its doors one Saturday of every month to accommodate the rising numbers of users.

Run by the charity Doctors of the World UK, Project: London has been working since 2006 with the aim of helping the most vulnerable get access to medical treatment and advice. It aims to reach asylum seekers, migrants, homeless people, and vulnerable women, such as sex workers or migrant domestic workers, and as such, the project’s free services have become increasingly in demand.

Starting on Saturday 3 July, the new opening hours of the walk-in health clinic will allow access for those unable to make it during the week. The clinic’s volunteer medical support staff offer users practical information and assistance about how to access mainstream medical services, which are often denied or are inaccessible to the most vulnerable.

Project: London is based at Praxis, Pott Street, Bethnal Green, London E2 0EF, and is open Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 1-5pm, and the first Saturday of every month, 10-3pm. No appointment necessary.

Project London (http://www.doctorsoftheworld.org.uk/projectlondon/default.Asp)

Doctors of the World (http://www.doctorsoftheworld.org.uk/)

Health of Migrants − the Way Forward: Report

World Health Organisation, International Organisation for Migration and the Ministry of Health and Social Policy of Spain organized a Global Consultation on the health of migrants in Madrid on 3−5 March 2010.This publication provides a synthesis of the key discussion points of the Consultation, its outcomes and the background materials prepared for the event.

Full report:

http://www.who.int/hac/events/consultation_report_health_migrants_colour_web.pdf

Belgrave Library hosts health and well-being event

By Tichaona Manomano

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