Education and training in psychiatry in low- and middle-income countries during and after the COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

The World Psychiatric Association (WPA) is the largest scientific association in the mental health field, bringing together more than 250 000 psychiatrists from all over the world. It was first established in 1950, with the main aim to organize world psychiatric conferences (Fuss et al., 2019; Giallonardo, 2019; Kallivayalil, 2019; Perris, 2020; Sartorius & Sartorius, 2020). Along the decades, the association has broadened its scope to encompass educational (www.wpanet.org; Kutcher & Wei, 2020), scientific (Botbol, 2019, 2020), ethical (Herrman, 2019b), and clinical domains (Reynolds, 2020), with the final aim to improve psychiatric care for people with mental disorders (Herrman, 2019, 2020; Kallivayalil, 2020a, 2020b; Wasserman & Future, 2021) and professional development of psychiatrists (Javed, 2020; Pinto da Costa, 2020; Pinto da Costa et al., 2019). The attention devoted to education is witnessed by the presence of a Secretary for Education in the Executive Committee, whose role is to coordinate the educational activities of the WPA and to work with WPA Zonal Representatives, Member Societies, and the Secretaries of Sections and Meetings to ensure the dissemination of educational programs (Ng, 2020; Ng et al., 2019). Moreover, a specific Section on Education in Psychiatry was established in 1970, being one of the oldest WPA Scientific Sections (Fiorillo et al., 2013; Schulze, 2020a; Schulze, 2020b). The WPA has also an educational portal on its website (www. wpanet.org), with several materials for educators and trainees. All 70 WPA Scientific Sections are interested in education, covering basically all mental disorders (Cohen et al., 2019), therapeutic approaches (Linardon et al., 2019; Naeem et al., 2020), at-risk populations (Bertelli et al., 2020; Wasserman et al., 2021), and diagnostic techniques (Giordano & Borgwardt, 2019; Torous et al., 2020). In this special issue of Asia-Pacific Psychiatry, the WPA Section on Education in Psychiatry has collected contributions from researchers and scholars from different parts of the world, specifically focusing on the quality of training in lowand middle-income countries (LMICs) (Kallyvayallil & Enara, 2021). This issue includes also the views of early career psychiatrists on difficulties and advantages of being trained in psychiatry in LMICs (El Halabi et al., 2021; Mihai et al., 2021; Giurgiuca et al., 2021; Sahadevan et al., 2021). A specific paper deals with education on addiction psychiatry, a neglected topic in the scientific literature, but which is particularly relevant for psychiatric practice in LMICs (Balhara et al., 2021). The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on training and education in psychiatry (Fiorillo & Gorwood, 2020; Gorwood & Fiorillo, 2021; Kuzman et al., 2020; Wasserman et al., 2020), which has been particularly significant in LMICs (Banerjee et al., 2020; De Sousa et al., 2020; Javed et al., 2021), has been further analyzed by Kalayasiri and Wainipitapong (2021). The results of an online survey carried out by the WPA Section on Education in Psychiatry under the supervision of the WPA President Elect, Prof. Danuta Wasserman, on the actual educational needs of Member Societies and WPA Zones, are also presented (Sampogna et al., 2021). The results of the first online edition of the train-the-trainer workshop, carried out by the WPA Section on Education in Psychiatry, which has brought together more than 100 participants from different parts of the world, are discussed by Baessler et al. (2021). Finally, the importance of using digital resources and online platforms for facilitating and improving the dissemination of educational programs and activities worldwide, in particular in LMICs, has also been stressed (Nasir et al., 2020; Orsolini et al., 2021; Ouanes et al., 2021). We hope that trainees, educators, and all those involved in mental health will join us in reading this special issue, and we are particularly grateful to the Editor, Prof. Allan Tasman, former Chair of the WPA Section on Education in Psychiatry and former Secretary for Education of the WPA, for making this endeavor possible.