Living with the Times, A Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Toolkit for Older Adults During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Published Date

Living with the Times: a mental health and psychosocial support toolkit for older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic has been developed by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee Reference Group on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergency Settings (IASC MHPSS RG).

This resource includes posters with key messages for older adults on how to take care of their well-being and how they can provide support to those around them during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. It includes instructions for facilitators of mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) on how to conduct guided conversations with older adults using these posters. The posters build upon the guidance sections for older adults in the IASC Interim Briefing Note Addressing Mental Health and Psychosocial Aspects of COVID-19 Outbreak, and the IASC Guidance on Operational Considerations for Multisectoral Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Programmes during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

The production of this toolkit involved an iterative and participatory development process, which began with pilot-testing to understand what style of illustrations and designs worked best for older adults. A total of 199 older adults aged between 60 and 90 years, from 51 countries, provided inputs to the design and content via an online survey and a number of focus group consultations. The process was a unique inter-agency collaboration between experts from different disciplines, including dementia, MHPSS in humanitarian settings, and ageing and disability. Through a network of country-level MHPSS Technical Working Groups, the posters were then tested with 80 older adults from a wide range of countries, based on geographical location and different income groups and contexts. This testing phase included older adults living in humanitarian settings from a total of 10 countries. The posters with key messages require minimal reading skills, are culturally diverse and aim to engage older adults in conversations and activities.

Our sincere appreciation goes to all the older adults who guided and informed the development of this toolkit. This is a tool to be used by all COVID-19 and humanitarian responders to help treat the mental health and psychosocial well-being of older adults as a priority.

©IASC, 2021. This publication was published under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercialShareAlike 3.0 IGO license (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/igo. Under the terms of this license, you may reproduce, translate and adapt this work for noncommercial purposes, provided the work is appropriately cited.

Posters

The posters with key messages can be found at the end of the toolkit. The posters and instructions in this toolkit were designed so that each poster can also be used stand-alone. The posters are best printed on A3 paper (minimum size A4) or shown on large screens (not on mobile phones or tablets).

For posters in high-resolution format and for printing instructions, see: https://app.mhpss.net/toolkit-for-older-adults-during-covid-19-pandemicor email: mhpss.refgroup@gmail.com.

 

Translations, accessible formats and adaptations

Please contact the IASC Reference Group on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (mhpss.refgroup@gmail.com) for the coordination of translations and preferred formats. All completed translations and versions will be posted on the IASC MHPSS RG website.

If you create a translation or an adaptation of this work, kindly note that:

  • You are not allowed to add your logo (or that of a funding agency) to the product.
  • In case of adaptation (i.e. changes to the text or images), the use of the IASC logo is not permitted
  • In any use of this work, there should be no suggestion that IASC endorses any specific organization, product or service.
  • You should add the following disclaimer, in the language of the translation: “This translation/adaptation was not created by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC). The IASC is not responsible for the content or accuracy of this translation. The original English edition ‘Inter-Agency Standing Committee: Living with the Times: a mental health and psychosocial support toolkit for older adults during the COVID-19 pandemic’ shall be the binding and authentic edition.”
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