Electives, internships and volunteering options for students and professionals from the subject area of psychology, psychiatry, psychotherapy and social work can be arranged at the "Mental Hospital", the psychiatric clinic of Zanzibar. The clinic has an outpatient's department which is open three days per week, receiving around 100 patients each day. 

Further there is an inpatients department for women that currently accommodates 23 female patients who are not allowed to leave the hospital. For men, there are two departments with together around 60 people, most of which are also not allowed to leave the premises.

Surprisingly, the duration which the patient spend at the hospital is relatively short - between a few days and a few weeks. Once they are released they often return. It is in most cases relatives of the patients who contact the Mental Hospital as their last hope if the treatment through traditional healers or general practitioners doesn't achieve the improvements they expect. 

Another department of the hospital accommodates an area of occupational therapy where the patient are drawing and painting, and sometimes perform gardening or carpentry work.

If there are funds, staff of the hospital also drives to the Cottage Hospitals which are located at various locations of the island or visit patients at home. 

Psychological and psychiatric treatments don't play an important role in developing countries such as Zanzibar. For that reason the hospital has very limited financial resources. The hospital just employs one professional psychiatrist, but it regularly has foreign psychologists, psychotherapists and psychiatrists which are sent from the Cuban government as part of a socialist development and exchange program, from China or from Norway.

If you are a student doing an internship/elective, those foreign professionals can be mentoring/supervising you. 

All further staff are psychiatric nurses and social workers. In Tanzania there is no possibility to study psychology, nor are there any possibilities for further training. Therefore the director and the staff depend on the support of foreign volunteers and exchange programs to guarantee a satisfactory standard of support for the patients. 

Particularly interesting, but also challenging, is the existence of traditional beliefs. Most mental problems are being explained through the possession of evil spirits, witchcraft etc. Instead of a consulting a trained psychologist, psychotherapist or psychiatrist, in such cases it is common to first see traditional healers and witchdoctors. Even the staff of the hospital is convinced about the existence of such phenomena and it will be interesting for foreign volunteers and interns to see how such ways of thinking can be combined with contemporary Western approaches to the topic.

Info box:

Place: Zanzibar, Tanzania

Duration: from 3 weeks*

Specific qualification required: Yes 

Cost: For duration of less than 90 days: trouble-free package 250 €, additionally a weekly contribution of 75 USD has to be paid directly to the clinic. For duration of more than 90 days: trouble-free package 500 €, no weekly contribution applies.

Accommodation: Not included

Meals: Not included

Inclusive of: Placement in the project; if you opt for the trouble-free package the whole range of services which is part of the trouble-free package is included

Not included: Travel, health insurance, visa, work permit

Book this placement now!

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* For shorter durations it is possible to be at the mental hospital as part of "Voluntourism Hopper".