1. Access to services for people with disabilities in challenging environment Handicap International Amman – 2009

2. National Institution of Social Care and Vocational Training The Family Guidance Center – Lebanon

3. Who are we?  My name is Tarek Féghali, speech and Language therapist, representing “The National Institution of Social Care and Vocational Training - Beit Atfal Assumoud - the Family Guidance Center”  Partners of HI Liban.

4.  Our center provides mental health services to people in need, living in the Palestinian refugee camps and gatherings, in three major areas in Lebanon : Beirut, capital city; Tyre, in the South; and the North  Through this participation, we aim to share and learn the best practices from around the world, concerning the delivery of services to persons with disabilities in challenging environments

5. Achievements  Providing mental health services to children and adolescents, and their families  Increasing outreach activities, through awareness-raising campaigns to psychiatric nurses, social workers, educators and parents

6. Strengths  Team/work Holistic approach  Moving towards a community approach  Good access as to affordability and acceptability

7. Obstacles  Availability of services (variety of services and coverage of the growing need)  Affordability (people unable of paying for some services, or moving to other areas to get the service needed)

8.  Acceptability of the people with disabilities in society, and the stigma families might have for disabled children  Inadequate environment and lack of adaptation for people with special needs

9. Opportunities  Focus more on Prevention/Promotion  Establish the center as a “training center”  Reinforce relationship with UNRWA and major policy and services providers

10.  “Go out of the center” to the community  Increasing the number of NGO’s providing services  Providing free-of-charge services to people, regardless of their cultural / political / ethnic background

11.  Ensuring transportation fees to the services facilities  Increasing the awareness of people around mental health and advantage of appropriate care  Ensuring proper adapted structures for certain disabilities (in the domains of health, education, employment…)

12. ??? The feasibility of home-based-care for people who cannot access services facilities