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S004-4

Mood Disorders

Malcolm Hopwood

Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists, Australia

Background/Objective: Singapore has a population of 5.4 million people. The Institute of Mental
Health is the de-facto tertiary mental health centre. Over the past decade(s), mental health care in
Singapore has been moving towards community-based care. Recently, there is a move towards
providing regional mental health services within the country and this involves empanelment
strategies to allow the same treating team to manage the patients while they are hospitalized and also
when they are living in the community. The team would work closely with the regional primary
health care providers as well as other community partners including the mental health and social
government agencies and voluntary (ie non-governmental) welfare organizations. In addition, there
is also a need to engage grassroots leaders via a multi-pronged approach, first allowing the mental
health providers to understand the concerns and needs of the grassroots leaders and then to build
their capacity to manage persons with mental health issues through mental health trainings.

Conclusion: The need for child and adolescent mental health is not met anywhere in the world
requiring more research into the burden, risk and protective factors, interventions and models of care
in different parts of the world.