Mass. General Hospital Team Develops New Plan for Care

A research team at the Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital has devised a new treatment model to identify Chinese immigrants suffering from depression and to help them to overcome the stigma associated with mental illness in order to obtain necessary psychological care.

In a report on their findings in the December American Journal of Public Health, the MGH team wrote that the implementation of their model led to a sevenfold increase in the percentage of depressed patients seeking treatment.

The team, which was led by Dr. Albert S. Yeung, assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, sought to overcome the cultural and language barriers that Chinese immigrants often face when interacting with their primary care physicians.

According to Yeung, these obstacles often lead Chinese immigrants with depression to go undiagnosed.

“Many Chinese immigrants rarely seek out help for any problems beyond physical symptoms. The primary reason is that many Chinese immigrants do not understand the nature of depression,” Yeung said.

He added that depression is often  construed as being a sign of insanity in immigrant communities, and those suffering from the disease therefore often ignore their symptoms.

To combat these problems, the team developed a four-step model to identify, diagnose, and treat Chinese immigrants with depression.

They tested the model at the South Cove Community Center Hospital, where Yeung is on staff.

In the first step, patients are asked to fill out a short bilingual form in order to gauge their emotional state.

Patients are then informed of their results, and at-risk individuals are asked to participate in a “culturally sensitive interview.”

In this interview—which is conducted in Chinese—doctors explain the symptoms of depression to immigrants while trying to remain aware of the negative Chinese cultural view on depression.

In the final step, psychiatrists work with the patient’s primary care physician to set up a treatment plan—which may include medication—in order to assist the patient’s recovery.

“The hope is that one day this model can not only be used for Chinese immigrants, but also for other minority groups...to get them the help they need beyond physical symptoms,” Yeung said.