Akanksha Velath is a rising senior at Davidson College, majoring in Psychology with a minor in Public Health. Raised in India, she is deeply committed to advancing mental health awareness and dismantling stigma—both in her community and across other low- and middle-income countries. With a strong focus on cultural sensitivity, Akanksha aspires to develop community-based interventions and adapt existing mental health tools for underserved populations. Akanksha is committed to driving change at both systemic and interpersonal levels, combining policy advocacy with compassionate person-centered approaches.
This summer, Akanksha worked under the mentorship of Dr. Jennifer J. Mootz to assess the feasibility of Interpersonal Psychotherapy for Couples (IPT-C) to treat common mental disorders among women experiencing intimate partner violence (IPV) in Mozambique. Her responsibilities included screening and compiling a comprehensive IPV research database with over 14,000 articles using Covidence, and co-authoring a study protocol paper currently being prepared for submission to peer-reviewed public health journals. This work involved close engagement with grant documents, intervention materials, and ongoing communication with the site team in Mozambique. In parallel, Akanksha supported a separate project addressing opioid use in Mozambique. She conducted a systematic literature review on the application of Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) for opioid use globally, analyzing research across multiple databases to identify key limitations and guide future intervention strategies.
Akanksha is deeply grateful for this opportunity, which has sharpened her skills in research, academic writing, and critical analysis. The mentorship of Dr. Mootz, the support of the CCGMH team, and interactions with global mental health professionals have been instrumental in shaping her aspirations as both a clinician and a researcher. She looks forward to returning to Dr. Mootz’s lab this fall to continue co-authoring the manuscript and supporting the ongoing work in Mozambique.