Global Family Systems: Psychosocial Resilience during Covid-19

ISSUP UK would like to invite you to their Webinar on Global Family Systems: Psychosocial Resilience during COVID-19.

Time: 3PM UK Time

Register for the Webinar

In this webinar, we will discuss our project to explore with colleagues across the globe the public mental health interventions used to reduce risk and promote family and community well-being during the Covid-19 pandemic. We explore the utility and portability of family systems approaches across states, including in high income countries where the polity faces historically unmet needs; in conflict-affected states dealing with transitional justice; and in low and middle income countries with under-resourced institutions. In this webinar, we share how practitioners can use systemic family therapy approaches to promote family psychosocial resilience, recovery, and/or treatment during this ongoing public health emergency of international concern.

Learning Outcomes:

1. Understand the origin and application of systemic therapeutic models used across the international plane, including evidence-informed practice & sensitivity to context and cultural adaptation with at risk and vulnerable populations.
2. Examine the role of international norms with regard to state responsibility to promote individual, family, and community psychosocial health and well-being.
3. Describe the utility and portability of systemic psychotherapeutic interventions used to reduce risk and promote family psychosocial health during emergencies, including those delivered via telehealth.

Speakers:

Dr Laurie L. Charlés

drlaurielcharles [at] hushmail [dot] com (Dr. Laurie L Charlés) is a licensed marriage and family therapist and qualitative researcher whose scholarship and consultation practice is focused on scaling up family therapy practices for host country nationals in fragile, conflict and violence affected states. Her work focuses on how to enhance family systems focused public mental health initiatives with vulnerable and at-risk populations. Her most recent projects have been as an international consultant/trainer for the United Nations Office in Vienna, working to deliver a UNODC Treatnet Family Therapy package to practitioners from 15 countries in South, Central, and Southeast Asia; as a consultant for in a project to create a grassroots toolkit for practitioners engaged in Transitional Justice and Reconciliation Initiatives in Sri Lanka; and as 2017-2018 Fulbright Global Scholar Program Fellow in Kosovo and Sri Lanka. She holds a PhD in Family Therapy from Nova Southeastern University and an MA in International Relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. She is author of International Family Therapy: A Guide for Multilateral Systemic Practice in Mental Health and Psychosocial Support (2021, Routledge).

Dr Gameela Samarasinghe

Dr. Gameela Samarasinghe is a Clinical Psychologist by training and an Associate Professor in Psychology in the Department of Sociology, University of Colombo, Sri Lanka. She has been a member of various advisory groups developing strategies for post-conflict trauma in Sri Lanka as well as internationally, working with colleagues from across the globe. Based in Colombo, Gameela has been the recipient of numerous research grants including the Fulbright- Hays Senior Research Scholar Award (2004-2005) at Boston University and the Fulbright Advanced Research Award (2013 – 2014) at Columbia University’s School of Public Health. She is co-editor, with Laurie L Charlés, of Family Systems and Global Humanitarian Mental Health: Approaches in the Field (2019) and Family Therapy in Global Humanitarian Contexts: Voices and Issues in the Field (2016).