Rural Friendship Bench: A qualitative study in Zaka district, Zimbabwe

We piloted the Friendship Bench-an evidence-based, urban-area task sharing intervention for common mental disorders-in rural Zimbabwe. The intervention combines problem solving therapy with income generating activities. This study sought to understand the intervention's implementation in terms of acceptability, feasibility, and sustainability as well as local attitudes towards mental wellbeing in rural Zimbabwe.

Using four separate semi-structured interview guides, we conducted in-depth interviews (N = 32) with patients (n = 9), village health workers (n = 12), nurses (n = 6), and community leaders (n = 5). We analyzed our data using thematic analysis with a diverse coding team using an integrative deductive-inductive approach.

Five themes emerged: 1) explanatory models for mental illness, 2) clinical workflow and emphasis on documentation, 3) positive feedback about the Friendship Bench, 4) accessibility, and 5) feasibility.

In its current format, our intervention was acceptable but neither feasible nor sustainable. Sociocultural context is critical in the development of rural task sharing interventions for mental health. We thus recommend a robust pilot and adaptation phase when scaling task sharing interventions in rural sub-Saharan Africa to elevate community voices, leverage existing social structures, and embed interventions as deeply into communities as possible.