Methods Overview of Methodology
Methods
Overview of Methodology
This project is a quality improvement project that aims at creating awareness on the importance of mental health first aid in church set-ups. The church of interest is the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and the people of interest are the church leaders. According to the World Health Organization guidelines on mental health and substance abuse, social support is elementary in the process of recovery. As an assumption, mental health first aid within the church may help in providing the needed social support to the mentally ill patients within the church. The church leaders’ understanding of the concepts of mental first aid course in the church is key to the implementation process.
To determine the perception of the leaders on the importance of mental health first aid course, a pre-survey questionnaire will be availed to the participants. Besides, the participants will be interviewed to test their understanding of mental health first aid. Additionally, the study seeks to educate church leaders on mental health first aid to ensure that they pass this critical knowledge to the members of the church. Finally, a post-survey will be provided to the selected sample to test their understanding after the teaching program.
Project Design
The project design is largely qualitative. Qualitative project design is essential when studying such aspects as human behavior, opinions, and themes through an open-ended question. The perception of religious leaders in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church is primarily based on opinion; hence the qualitative project design is appropriate. Examining the religious beliefs within the church falls under the ethnography type of qualitative research. Through the quantitative project design, a survey question with an ordinary scale response will be conducted to determine the participants’ level of understanding of mental health first aid and treatment. Having known their perception, an educational program will be rolled out on western treatment options for mental health conditions and mental health first aid. Rolling the educational program on mental health first aid will involve preparing teaching materials based on MHFA. The study will equally involve the issuance of pre and post-survey questionnaires to test the outcome of the educational program.
Setting
The project setting is the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The church will be visited during the project period to teach the church leaders on mental health first aid and to explore their perceptions of mental health conditions.
Participants
The participants in this project will be the church leaders. I seek to engage all the church leaders when making inquiries about their perception of mental health conditions and mental health first aid. The inclusion criterion, in this case, is church leadership. The study sample will be 20 participants from Seattle and surrounding areas of Ethiopian Orthodox church leaders. Currently, the church (Ethiopian Orthodox Church) has 30 leaders. Apart from seeking permission from the top leadership within the church, the study will exclude five of the top leaders from taking the surveys because they hardly interact with the community members at an individual level.
Data Collection
The primary data collection techniques that I will use include interviews and questionnaires to test the understanding of the church leaders on mental health conditions. Pre and post-learning outcomes surveys will be conducted to know the understanding of the church leaders regarding mental health first aid. The interview/questionnaire questions will be arranged per themes. The first theme will test on the understanding of the church leader on the various mental health conditions and how they affect people. The second theme will test their understanding of the concept of mental health first aid and how it may help in managing the conditions. The third theme in the questionnaire will target responses related to their understanding of the use of western medications to treat mental health conditions. Conducting the surveys through these themes will make the analysis per theme easier.
Outcome Measures
- To educate church leaders on the use of mental health first aid concepts.
- To determine church leaders’ understanding of mental first aid.
- To determine the perception of church leaders on the western approach to mental health conditions.
To determine the church leaders’ understanding of the concepts of mental health first aid, I will look at the responses provided on the survey that relate to the theme of mental health first aid. Their understating on the topic depends on how relevant the responses provided are. To determine the perception of the church leaders on western approaches to mental health conditions, I will evaluate the responses provided on the survey relating to the topic and determine how relevant they are.
Data Analysis
The research Thematic analysis will be used to make sense out of the collected data. Being that the surveys were organized in various themes at the data collection stage, the analysis through themes will make it possible to understand the perception of the leaders regarding mental health conditions and their understanding of the concepts of mental health first aid. The use of the ordinal scale will make it possible to analyze the themes and come up with well informed conclusions.
Ethical Considerations
Throughout the study, I will observe all the ethical norms associated with the study. I will ensure that the sample population is selected at will and that their participation is not in any way coerced. Additionally, I will ensure that the identity of the sample population remains anonymous. The confidentiality of the sample population is essential. I look forward to designing the questionnaires and the interviews to include initials as a basic way of identification. As such, it will be possible to keep the identity of the participants anonymous. Besides, I will ensure that the information provided by the sample population does not fall into the hands of any unauthorized individual. I will be responsible for the safekeeping of the collected data to prevent it from landing into the wrong hands. Once the collected data becomes obsolete, I will use the appropriate disposal methods to get rid of the information. Finally, I will obtain my project’s approval from the institutional review board.
Weaknesses and Strength
One of the strengths of the project is that it has received huge support from the church leadership. The church leaders understand the effects of mental health conditions within the church. The leaders have admitted that they are open to any recommendations that will help in creating proper social support for those suffering from mental health conditions in the church. Besides, the inclusion of mental health first aid may help in preventing the cases of stigmatization in the church. The primary weakness is that the top leaders in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church will not take part in the survey because they do not closely interact with the church members as opposed to the other church leaders.