Perceptions of the Traditional Health Practitioner’s role in the management of mental health care users and occupation: a pilot study

South African Journal of Occupational Therapy — Volume 44, Number 1, April 2014 INTRODUCTION Allopathy, for the purpose of this paper, refers to “the treatment of disease by conventional means”1:36 and is used in the broadest sense of the word and includes persons who are traditionally part of the multi-disciplinary team working with mental health care users, i.e. psychiatrists, medical practitioners, psychiatric nurses, occupational therapists, psychologists and social workers. Here it is used in contrast to traditional healing carried out by practitioners of traditional African medicine in the community in which illness is thought to be the result of witchcraft, contact with impure objects or through neglect of the ancestors2. The term allopathic in reference to mainstream health care was preferred to “western”, which is also found in the literature, because it was perceived to be more neutral. The traditional health practitioners’ (THPs’) role in their communities in South Africa has long been acknowledged. Although the practice of traditional healing was illegal2,3 in terms of the Health Professions Act4 (HPA) prior to the democratisation of the country, there were organisations which registered THPs5 and THPs continued to practice in their communities6. It is reported that allopathic health care practitioners turned a blind eye to THPs and in some cases even collaborated with them informally2. The publication of the White Paper on the Transformation of the Health System7 in 1997 effectively decriminalised traditional health care and placed the role of THPs firmly on the health care transformation agenda2. Despite reported informal collaboration between allopathic practitioners and THPs, there are no published studies on collaboration or even mutual points of interest between occupational therapists and THPs. Very little is known about THPs’ knowledge of occupational therapy or the importance (if any) of occupation in traditional healing. In an open and democratic South Africa, greater collaboration in the interest of the patient will become increasingly Perceptions of the Traditional Health Practitioner’s role in the management of mental health care users and occupation: a pilot study