Attitudes of Primary Care Health Workers Towards Mental Health Patients: A Cross-Sectional Study in Osun State, Nigeria

Abstract

World Health Organization (WHO) recommends integration of mental health services into primary health services; however attitude of primary health care workers is one barrier to this. A cross sectional survey using the Community Attitudes towards Mental Illness (CAMI) was done. One hundred and twenty primary care workers were randomly selected from three local government areas. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used in analyses. The results showed that most primary health care workers hold a benevolent (mean = 2.47, SD = 0.52) attitude towards the mentally ill. Workers with 10 years or more experience tend to have less authoritarian (t = 3.19, p = 0.01) and less social restrictive (t = 3.90, p = 0.01) attitudes towards the mentally ill. There were no significant differences in attitude by gender, marital status, or designation of health care workers. The study showed that primary care workers have attitudes similar to that seen in the general population.

Keywords: Attitudes; Community attitudes towards mentally ill; Cross sectional; Primary health care workers.