Addressing challenges for psychotherapy supervision in global mental health through experiential learnings from rural...

As the field of global mental health grows, many psychotherapy trainees will work across cultures in low-resource settings in high-income countries or in low- and middle-income countries. Mentors and supervisors, including faculty members, may face several challenges in providing supervision for psychologists in low-resource settings. As such, there is a need to develop best practices for psychotherapy supervision in global mental health. We describe the common challenges and potential strategies in psychotherapy supervision based on our research, clinical, and academic partnerships between academic institutions, a nonprofit organization, and the Nepali government. The strategies and considerations we have found helpful include focusing on therapies with strong behavioral and interpersonal (rather than emotional or cognitive) components and using locally validated therapies or standard manuals that have been endorsed by the WHO for low-resource settings. Other strategies include providing psychotherapy training for local psychiatrists who may be in supervisory roles using the train-the trainer models to help them gain competence in navigating different expectations of social structures and family dynamics. Supervisors face many challenges while supporting trainees and early psychologists in global mental health settings. While ensuring local adaptation, key considerations can be developed into best practices to support supervisors, particularly psychiatrists and other faculty members based in high-income settings, and trainees based in low- and middle-income countries.