My guest this week is clinical psychologist Dr. Daisy Singla. We talked about the exciting research that Daisy is doing, both in North America and throughout the world. I think what I love most about her work is that she’s finding truly innovative ways to address the global mental health care crisis. There are just too many of us in need of help to be able to meet these needs with the current model of long, expensive therapy with a highly trained specialist. Much of our conversation focused on interventions for perinatal depression, but the techniques that work in this context are helpful in general.

Topics we discussed included:

• My guest’s aim to improve access to mental health care for common issues like anxiety, depression, and stress
• The shortcomings of current models to meet the demand for mental health services
• What works for preventing perinatal depression
• The effectiveness of brief psychological treatment
• Lack of access to quality mental health care in developing countries, and in developed countries
• How addressing parenting issues reduces depression among perinatal women
• How partners can support mothers and lower their risk for depression
• Broadening our concept of “interventions” for mental health
• Training non-specialists to deliver brief psychological interventions
• The importance of community buy-in when offering interventions
• Daisy’s review of the effectiveness of non-specialist providers for addressing depression
• The Pragmatic Clinical Study Award that Daisy received to administer the largest psychotherapy trial in the world
• The advantages of treating perinatal depression with behavioral activation:
  • High effectiveness compared to other treatments
  • Patient-centered preference for behavioral (non-medical) treatment
  • Ease of training non-specialist providers
• The fantastic team that’s co-leading The SUMMIT Trial

Daisy Singla, PhD, is an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto, and the first womenmind scientist at the Center of Addiction and Mental Health.

Daisy has led or contributed to large clinical trials focused on improving child growth, health and development, as well as reducing maternal depression worldwide.

She has collaborated with global mental health leaders and local NGOs in rural Uganda, Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, India and Pakistan. She now brings these innovative lessons to the United States and Canada. In 2018, she became the youngest recipient of a US$13.1 million Pragmatic Clinical Study Award which aims to scale up talk therapies for perinatal populations across North America.

In 2021, she received the Janet Taylor Spence Award for Transformative Early Careers from the Association for Psychological Science, and the Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution in Applied Psychology from the American Psychological Association (APA).

Daisy aspires to increase access to evidence-based psychological treatments to enrich the lives of all women, their children and their families.

Learn more about Daisy’s work at the The SUMMIT Trial website.