On 16 July 2020, a live online presentation and forum on “Managing Your Mental Health During a Pandemic” was conducted by the Mind Matters Club of IMU. It was conducted via the Mind Matters Club Facebook page and was moderated by IMU MBBS Semester 9 students, Mohamed Shadhid and Mooi Zhen Jack. The others involved in the organising of this event were Tong Jiun Yan, Ngu Ying Jing and Candal Chew She-Yi. The 2 speakers were Prof Philip George and Dr Abdul Rasyid from the Psychiatry Department of IMU. This was part of IMU Cares’ efforts to encourage staff and students to continue to engage the community through technology as a new norm during this pandemic.
The event was held with the following objectives: |
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To help students in IMU understand the common mental health issues during the pandemic and these trying times |
To help students understand ways of increasing mental health resilience to cope with the challenges |
To identify and help cope with the challenges that the pandemic and the Recovery Movement Control Order is putting on teaching and learning at IMU |
The event had close to 37 live viewers and half an hour after the presentations was dedicated to questions posed by the audience and prior sent questions. The whole event lasted an hour from 8pm to 9pm. The forum was recorded on Facebook and students were invited to view at a later date if they wanted. To date there have been a total of 835 views from IMU students. The Organising Committee is encouraged to consider organising another similar event to focus again on the mental health of students during these trying times.
Written by Prof Philip George