Pietermaritzburg Mental Health

PMB Mental Health provides mental health services to 1505 persons with mental and intellectual disabilities. There are 5 residential facilities which house 181 residents. The homes provide basic and affordable twenty-four hour residential care and support for adults with mental disabilities in order to prevent further mental disability or emotional needs. Therapeutic, rehabilitative and developmental programmes for each individual person as well as individual counselling and group work  provided by social workers. Social workers also assist with finances by administering the disability grants to ensure there is no misuse. Qualified nursing staff provides physical and medical care together with trained caregivers. Education and life skill training. An Employment progamme where protective day care is provided. There are 404 service users who attend at the three various workshops. Here they receive training in work activities and work skills such as cleaning; catering; laundry; car wash sewing wood work, literacy and gardening. Empowering life skills training such as personal independence and socialisation skills is done to achieve their optimum level of functioning. They take part in extracurricular activities such as sport and fundraising  events. trained and assessed individuals are placed into suitable workplace opportunities in the open labour market. Service users in the workshop provide companies labour for packaging or assembly or related tasks at competitive prices.

STAFF :

PMB Mental Health currently employs 80 staff to render these services. Regular and constant staff training remains a priority to ensure quality services. A Board of Management meets monthly to monitor and evaluate and ensure the smooth running of the organisation and its finances. This board is elected annually at the Annual General Meeting.

FINANCES :

PMB Mental Health has a budgeted expenditure of R19 000 000. The income comprises of state subsidies (50%) for services rendered on behalf of: Department of Social Development [DSD] these subsidies have not increased over the past seven years, which has added to the financial challenge. Department of Health   Department of Employment and Labour. Income is also generated from residential fees and contract work for companies. Fundraising includes applications for funding from various trust funds lotteries and companies with corporate responsibilities funds . We continue to experience severe challenges in securing sufficient funding for running costs such as salaries municipal costs and maintenance and we anticipate a severe deficit this year. Audited financial statements are available on request.