Heartbeat of Humanity

In 2022, Danish Red Cross and IFRC jointly commissioned an external evaluation of the work of the PS Centre for the years 2015 to 2022. The evaluation reviewed the functions and activities of the PS Centre, seeking to highlight achievements as well as challenges in fulfilling its mandate. In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, mental health and psychosocial health specialist and external evalua...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Arz Stephan and Guleed Dualeh, MHPSS Technical Advisors with the PS Centre discuss the importance of and how to ensure wellbeing for Red Cross and Red Crescent staff and volunteers.

In this podcast of Heartbeat of Humanity, Communications Officer, Trine, interviews Guleed Dualeh, IFRC PS Centre MHPSS Technical Advisor for the African Region and the Psychological First Aid focal point on Guleed's recent trip to Kenya, where he sat down with Red Cross MHPSS focal points for Kenya and South Sudan, Dorcas Khasowa (KE) and Marcos Tabule (SS), to talk about challenges and achi...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews Bethan McEvoy, MHPSS delegate for the Danish Red Cross in Ukraine, and Anna Didenko, Head of the MHPSS Unit in the Ukrainian Red Cross Society, about the MHPSS needs of Ukrainians and the Red Cross response one year into the Russia-Ukraine International Armed conflict. This podcast was...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews Sarah Harrison, Head of the MHPSS Technical Unit in the Psychosocial Centre, about her mental health and psychosocial support assessment in Ukraine. This episode of Heartbeat of Humanity was funded by the European Union. Its contents are the sole responsibility of the IFRC Psychosocial Centre and do not necess...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Communications Officer Jesper Guhle explores how humanitarian actors can support the mental well-being of children in migration. Participating in the podcast:   Orso Muneghina, head of the Global Programme Expert Group on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in SOS Children’s Village International Christel Voldby Winther, Program...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Technical Advisor Ea Suzanne Akasha focus on the mental health and psychosocial needs in Afghanistan. Ea talks to MHPSS Technical Advisor Diana Rahimi about  working in a marastoon, and Danish Red Cross MHPSS delegate Nives Vudric stationed in Kabul about  the plans for scaling up the  mental health and psychosocial support program...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity,  IFRC Psychosocial Centre Project Assistant Veronika Dietz interviews Eva Svoboda, Deputy Director of International Law and Policy of the International Committee of the Red Cross. Eva is co-leading one of the five working groups within the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement implementing the Movement's MHPSS commitments,  Working Group  five, dedicated to...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews Sarah Davidson, Head of Psychosocial & Mental Health at British Red Cross, and Sarah Harrison, Technical Team Lead in the IFRC Psychosocial Centre. Sarah and Sarah are co-leading one of the five working groups within the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement implementing the Movement&apo...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Senior Communications Advisor Jesper Guhle interviews Technical Team Lead Sarah Harrison about how Red Cross Red Crescent staff and volunteers can implement suicide prevention services in their programmes. In the podcast, a suicide prevention guide is mentioned. Find it here: https://pscentre.org/?resource=suicide-prevention

In this episode, Technical Advisor Sarah Harrison interviews MHPSS Advisor Pernille Hansen about community mental health care and the steps staff and volunteers in Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies can take to begin working with community mental health. Links WHO Mental Health Gap Action Programme (mhGAP) Podcast: Scalable Psychological Interventions

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Ea Suzanne Akasha, Technical Advisor at the IFRC Psychosocial Centre, interviews professor Dr. Barbara Juen, technical manager of the psychosocial services at the Austrian Red Cross , and psychologist Vanessa Kulcar, about the mental health of children  and young adults.

8 March is International Women's Day, a day we  commemorate the cultural, political, and socioeconomic achievements of women. In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Technical Advisor Ea Suzanne Akasha focuses on violence against women and their children. According to new studies released by WHO, More than one in four women worldwide experience intimate partner violence before the age of 50...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Communications Officer Jesper Guhle explores the potential mental health consequences for people forced to migrate and what the Red Cross Red Crescent Staff and volunteers can do to support these people. Jesper interviews Villads Zahle, Senior Communications Coordinator in the European Council on Refugees and Exiles, Barly, dancer, artist, podcaster and ch...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Technical Advisor Ea Suzanne Akasha interviews Stephen Regel, Clinical Lead  for the Centre for Trauma, Resilience and Growth, about the effect of the pandemic on frontline workers and what we can do to support them.  Several resources were mentioned in this podcast episode:  Emotional Intelligence - Daniel Goleman Has the pandemic really caused a 'ts...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, IFRC Psychosocial Centre Technical  Advisor Eliza Cheung interviews Technical Advisor Melanie Powell about vaccine hesitancy - what is vaccine hesitancy and what should be the response. Melanie Powell is the author of the training module Psychological First Aid for vaccine hesitancy for COVID-19 , part of the training toolkit Psychological First Aid in the...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Technical Advisor Ea Suzanne Akasha interviews Pablo Suarez,  Associate Director for Research and Innovation at the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre about the link between climate change and mental health and psychosocial support. Publications In the podcast, several resources are mentioned: From Darkness to Illumination: Climate Grief and Resilience...

On World Suicide Day, Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews IFRC Psychosocial Centre Technical Advisor Kelly McBride about the causes of suicide and how suicide can be prevented. Kelly McBride is the author of Suicide Prevention and Suicide prevention during COVID-19 . The podcast Heartbeat of Humanity is about mental health and psychosocial support. The podcast is mainly for staff and vo...

Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews Technical Advisor Ea Suzanne Akasha about the importance of sleep. During the interview, Ea mentions several resources about sleep: Sleep well, Humanitarian: https://pscentre.org/?resource=sleep-well Sleep helps you cope in difficult times: https://pscentre.org/?resource=sleep-helps-you-cope-with-stressful-times Sleep Diary: https://pscentre.org/?reso...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, Technical Advisor Sarah Harrison interviews Milena Osorio, MHPSS Programme Coordinator at the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC). They talk about ICRC's MHPSS work, the populations they seek to assist, the delegates or staff providing services and how ICRC have been able to adapt their operations and services during the COVID-19 pandemic 

Communications Officer Jesper Guhle interviews Technical Advisor Sarah Harrison about her journey to North Macedonia to conduct a training on Mental Health and Psychosocial Support in Emergencies for 5 National Societies from the Balkan region. The training was co-facilitated with IFRC’s MHPSS Delegate for the EURO Region, Antonia de Barros Mota.

In this episode, Sarah Harrison, Technical Advisor for the PS Centre, interviews the authors of the newly released “A Hopeful, Healthy, and Happy Living and Learning toolkit," designed to facilitate support for children, parents/caregivers and teachers affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Listen to the toolkit's co-authors, Ea Suzanne Akasha, Mark Kucklow and Jonathan Morgan explain the re...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, technical advisor at the IFRC Psychosocial Centre Anouk Boschma interviews Alex Ssimbwa, the regional IFRC MHPSS delegate for the African region, who shares his passion for MHPSS and experience with working in the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement.  This episode explores the lessons learned in relation to MHPSS from the Ebola outbreak that can be applied to...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, technical advisor at the IFRC Psychosocial Centre Sarah Harrison explores the term ‘Scalable Psychological Interventions’, also known as low-intensity psychological interventions. This episode does not include guests, but rather takes a deep dive into the topic of Scalable Psychological Interventions, explaining what they are, where they come from, who the...

In this episode of Heartbeat of Humanity, technical advisor at the IFRC Psychosocial Centre Sarah Harrison interviews Dr. Eliza Cheung, also a technical advisor at the IFRC Psychosocial Centre, based in Hong Kong about the concept of pandemic fatigue and the results of a survey recently conducted by the Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies across the Asia Pacific region.