Nairobi

Tailoring Affordable Intimate Partner Violence and Mental Health Support for Kenyan Women in Informal Settlement

Columbia's School of Work Dr. Samantha Winter's NIH grant explores barriers and facilitators of IPV and mental health screening in Kenyan informal settlements.

May 02, 2024
Prof. Winters Training

Recent research suggests that nearly 85% of women in informal settlements in Nairobi, Kenya, experience Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) in their lifetime. Health policies in Kenya call for strategies to respond to and reduce such forms of violence against women and co-occurring mental health disorders. Columbia's Social Work Associate Professor, Dr. Samantha Winter, is leading an NIH research grant to tailor a low-cost intervention for IPV and mental health response for women in informal settlements in Kenya. Dr. Winter is working with Kenyan mental health and gender experts Millicent Dzombo and Lena Moraa to explore the potential facilitators and barriers to screening and intervention for IPV and related mental health challenges in healthcare settings in informal settlements in Kenya.

Prof Winter Training

The research has been running since 2021 and is currently in its last phase of implementing its key activities, including: 

  1. Combining an IPV intervention (Wings of Hope: WINGS) with the World Health Organization (WHO) mental health response intervention (Problem Management Plus: PM+) and adapting the combined (WINGS+PM+) intervention for use in existent healthcare settings in informal settlements in Nairobi.
  2. Pilot testing the adapted WINGS+PM+ intervention through a randomized control trial with 260 women to assess the safety, feasibility, and acceptability of WINGS+PM+ versus PM+-only as the foundation for a low-cost IPV services package that can expand services to women experiencing IPV in informal settlements.

To achieve this, Dr. Winter is leading an 18-day training with community leaders to implement a pilot intervention. Throughout this extensive initiative, 34 dedicated community members are actively involved, out of which 10 will screen potential participants for eligibility for the intervention, 16 will serve as facilitators guiding participants through the intervention process, and 8 will be responsible for completing longitudinal assessments to test the feasibility, acceptability, safety, and preliminary efficacy of the program.