Mental Health Disorders and Utilization of Mental Healthcare Services in United Nations Personnel

Adam D. Brown, Katharina Schultebraucks, Meng Qian, Meng Li, Danny Horesh, Carol Siegel, Yosef Brody, Abdalla Mansour Amer, Rony Kapel Lev-Ari, Francis Mas, Charles R. Marmar and Jillann Farmer, Global Mental Health (2020)

United Nations (UN) personnel address a diverse range of political, social, and cultural crises throughout the world. Compared with other occupations routinely exposed to traumatic stress, there remains a paucity of research on mental health disorders and access to mental healthcare in this population. To fill this gap, personnel from UN agencies were surveyed for mental health disorders and mental healthcare utilization. This study concluded that UN personnel appear to be at high risk for trauma exposure and screening positive for a mental health disorder, yet a small percentage screening positive for mental health disorders sought treatment. Despite the mental health gaps observed in this study, additional research is needed, as these data reflect a large sample of convenience and it cannot be determined if the findings are representative of the UN.