Skip to content
Call Us Today! 212-533-4646 | MON-FRI 12PM - 4PM (EST)
DONATE
SUBSCRIBE
Search for:
About Us
UNWLA 100
Publications
FAQ
Annual Report 2023
Annual Report 2022
Annual Report 2021
Initiatives
Advocate
Educate
Cultivate
Care
News
Newsletters
Sign Up For Our Newsletter
Join UNWLA
Become a Member
Volunteer With Us
Donate to UNWLA
Members Portal
Calendar
Shop to Support Ukraine
Search for:
Print
Print Page
Download
Download Page
Download Right Page
Open
1
2-3
4-5
6-7
8-9
10-11
12-13
14-15
16-17
18-19
20-21
22-23
24-25
26-27
28-29
30-31
32-33
34-35
36-37
38-39
40
“НАШЕ ЖИТТЯ”, ТРАВЕНЬ 2016 WWW.UNWLA.ORG 13 Coping with the trauma of war, particularly with one of the invisible but most horrible side-effects of war, is not something the mental health care sys- tem in Ukraine is prepared for. Psychological trauma from exposure to war afflicts soldiers, families, and children living in the war zone, refu- gees fleeing from the war zone, and families who have lost loved ones. It is a devastating condition that can disrupt daily functioning and often leads to depression or substance abuse. This trauma, now widely known as post-traumatic stress disor- der (PTSD), is treatable by modern U.S. and Euro- pean standards, and the most current interven- tions can produce dramatic results. Unfortunately, this is not the case in Ukraine where attention to and care of mental health disorders is generally neglected and mostly ineffective. To make matters worse, there is a stigma attached to mental health problems, which exacerbates the agony these vic- tims experience. As many of the articles and stories pub- lished in Our Life over the years have underscored, the UNWLA is a charitable organization, one that addresses the needs of people experiencing hard- ship and needing a helping hand, whether this be in our diaspora communities or in Ukraine. Since the beginning of the Maidan movement, the UN- WLA Social Welfare program has focused on the needs of the average Ukrainian in Ukraine. As the struggle for freedom morphed from demonstration to outright war, so did the UNWLA’s focus, and a large part of that focus has been directed at helping the wounded and the families left behind by those slain in this horrific conflict. Our most recent un- dertaking is the challenge of helping those suffer- ing from mental anguish after returning from the front as well as helping the families who welcome these tortured souls home. While visiting Ukraine in December of 2015, UNWLA Financial Secretary Vera Kushnir and I were apprised of the work at The Mental Health Institute at the Ukrainian Catholic Univer- sity (UCU). The status of PTSD in Ukraine, the Ukrainian medical profession’s limited capacity for addressing this problem, as well as the mission of the future Mental Health Institute (MHI) were presented to us by Dr. Oleh Romanchuk, director of the MHI, and by Nataliya Klymovska, UCU’s Vice President of Development and Communi- cation. In the course of these meetings and discus- sions, the UNWLA was invited to become involved with this important project. After returning to NYC, I presented this information about the pro- gram (mission statements, budgets, timeline, etc.) to the UNWLA Executive Board as well as to Social Welfare Chairperson Lidia Bilous and her commit- tee. The Executive Board unanimously approved the project, and the Social Welfare Committee ex- pressed its full support for this initiative. An offi- cial agreement with the Ukrainian Catholic Educa- tion Foundation in Chicago was signed, and an ini- tial donation of $100,000 was deposited into the account established for this project. The goal is to open the Mental Health In- stitute facility by early fall of 2016. The broad focus will be to raise awareness about mental health in general; the more specific focus is to train profes- sionals in modern treatment approaches, to estab- lish the clinic, and to create the specialized pro- grams to provide appropriate treatment. In Octo- ber 2015 UCU announced the establishment of a School of Rehabilitation Medicine to be headed by Dr. Ulana Suprun, Director of Humanitarian Initi- atives of the Ukrainian World Congress. Dr. Su- prun strongly believes that the Mental Health In- stitute will be a strong partner and a necessary component of the rehabilitation paradigm. She underscores that the Institute will practice evi- dence-based psychology and will be the leading authority on cognitive behavioral therapy in Ukraine. Taras Dobko, UCU’s Senior Vice Rector, also weighed in on this issue: “We understand that a person with physical disabilities has basic rights and needs like any other person. Our goal is to re- turn those soldiers and civilians who have suffered in the war to an independent and normal life, pre- serving their dignity, without creating a new gen- eration of ‘invalids’ who are dependent on society to receive financial support and feel that they are ‘second class.’ The opening of the school is UCU’s humble contribution to transforming the sphere of rehabilitation in the country.” While Mr. Dobko’s statement was in refer- ence to the UCU School of Rehabilitation, the same can unequivocally be said in reference to the Men- tal Health Institute. The healing of the “whole” person must address both the body and the spirit: the former through physical rehabilitation and the latter through mental rehabilitation. The UNWLA is committed to MHI’s mission of raising aware- ness about mental health issues and, as Mr. Dobko stated, this will be the UNWLA’s “humble contri- bution to transforming the sphere of [in this case, mental] rehabilitation in the country.”
Page load link
Go to Top
1 
2-3 
4-5 
6-7 
8-9 
10-11 
12-13 
14-15 
16-17 
18-19 
20-21 
22-23 
24-25 
26-27 
28-29 
30-31 
32-33 
34-35 
36-37 
38-39 
40 
