Reseach on Women's Mental Health

Women's Mental Health Project: "How I think and feel."

Photo of entrance to the Donald Beasley Institute.

This Lottery Health funded project will explore how women with an intellectual disability maintain their mental health and wellbeing. Twenty-four women will be interviewed. The interviews will include questions about how the women stay mentally well. Women with an intellectual disability often have mental health problems, like depression and anxiety. The study will include women who have had a mental illness. These women will be asked about their experiences of mental illness including the support that they have received. At the end of the study we will be able to provide information to health professionals about how to meet the mental health needs of women with an intellectual disability.

The project has National Health Ethics Committee approval and is in the recruitment phase. Initial recruitment will be through People First regional groups within Canterbury, Otago and Southland. Dr Brigit Mirfin-Veitch, Sue Gates and Jenny Conder will be conducting the interviews and they would be happy to hear from anyone interested in knowing more about the project.

Interviews are expected to begin in the second half of 2009.

As there was significant interest expressed for a similar study on men's mental health during the consultation phase for this project the DBI is planning to follow up with a project on men with intellectual disability and their mental health.