India’s second National Mental Health Survey (NMHS-2) will assess more than 2.5 lakh people using World Health Organisation (WHO) standards to ensure uniform training of field data collectors and consistency in the assessment of mental health disorders.
Funded by the Union Health Ministry and coordinated by the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS), the survey will cover adults aged 18 years and above and adolescents aged 13 to 17 years across all states. The survey is being conducted in 20 Indian languages.
The first National Mental Health Survey was conducted in 2015-16 in 12 states.
A research paper published in PLOS One by researchers from NIMHANS said maintaining data quality was a major challenge in mental health surveys because, unlike many physical illnesses, mental disorders do not have objective biomarkers.
The WHO Flexible Interview was selected for NMHS-2 as it is a fully structured diagnostic interview designed to identify mental disorders. Given the scale of the survey, with more than 2.5 lakh individual assessments, interviews would be conducted by trained lay interviewers rather than requiring a psychiatrist for every assessment.
The survey has adopted a standardised framework covering sampling, interviewing, supervision, data collection and corrective action across states with substantial differences in language, culture, geography, manpower and digital connectivity.
“The field data collectors undergo a structured six-week training programme involving lectures, video demonstrations, role plays and supervised field practice. They are evaluated and certified before deployment,” an official requesting anonymity told The Tribune.
To ensure quality control, a digital data collection platform with real-time dashboards has been developed. The software can function offline in areas with poor connectivity and supports monitoring through central dashboards, according to the research paper.
A central team would monitor indicators such as interview duration, disorder detection rates and unverifiable interviews. Random telephone callbacks and GPS information would also be used to verify fieldwork and assess the quality of data collection.
