Dixon Chibanda has been featured on the Financial Times, PBS NewsHour Brief But Spectacular episode, Positive News, and has written about his work for The Guardian, LA Times, Project Syndicate and has spoken to audiences at the World Economic Forum, Skoll World Forum, World Health Assembly, the Aspen Ideas Festival, and the TEDWomen conference. As a practicing medical doctor, professor of psychiatry & global mental health at the University of Zimbabwe and The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, Dixon has explored the intersection of indigenous knowledge and western models of care to develop sustainable interventions in global health. His TED talk on why he trains grandmothers to treat depression describes the journey of the Friendship Bench. Over 100 peer-reviewed scientific publications of the program are accessible online.
He has been for over a decade a key player in bringing the various stakeholders from local health authorities, health professionals, national and international researchers, and donors together to form successful collaborations. Dixon Chibanda is a psychiatrist with training in public health. He is the director of the African Mental Health Research Initiative (AMARI) which is a capacity building program aimed at developing excellence in leadership, training and science in Africa.
His research focus is community mental health with an emphasis on developing interventions that are delivered by non-professionals aimed at narrowing the treatment gap for mental, neurological and substance use disorders. His current research is around the Friendship Bench: a stepped-care psychological intervention, based on principles of cognitive behaviour therapy, which is delivered by trained community grandmothers in Zimbabwe. The Friendship Bench has shown effectiveness through 3 randomized controlled studies with the seminal work published in JAMA.
The concept of using park benches as spaces for community healing has been replicated in a number of countries which include Malawi, Botswana, Zanzibar, Vietnam, Jordan and l was adopted by the New York City Health Department’s Thrive program.
