For decades, mental issues have been discussed for too long without enough action.
Causes, effects, and control of drug addiction, and mental problems as a whole are often discussed, but accessibility to professional and humane mental-health and addiction care is still missing.
One year ago, on 22nd August, 2025, Ondo State witnessed the opening of a groundbreaking healthcare facility – Minds Medica.
Minds Medica is a Specialist Hospital and Drug Rehabilitation Centre, founded by a medical doctor, Dr Jibayo Adeyeye, and his wife, Professor Olufunke Adeyeye as the co-founder.
The facility was commissioned by Ondo State Governor, H.E. Lucky Aiyedatiwa, and it was described as the first private specialist mental-health and drug-rehabilitation facility of its kind in Ondo State.
Minds Medica was born out of Philanthropy
For Dr Jibayo Adeyeye, a specialist in Aesthetic medicine, the story of Minds Medica did not begin with a business mindset, it began with a caring heart.
Some years ago, he encountered a woman living with severe mental-health issues who had reportedly spent between 8 and 10 years moving around the streets.
He decided to help her get medical treatment and consulted a Neuropsychiatrist, and psychogeriatrician.
In the attempt to pick up the mentally challenged woman, another person was picked, and he ended up funding the treatments of 2 mentally ill persons.
Not long after, their conditions improved, and they began recovering their memories and were rehabilitated.
He got them new apartments, and employment, which they have lived on till today.
That experience stayed with him, but also raised a serious question: what happens to people who need psychiatric care but can not access it?
Unfortunately, for many families in Nigeria, mental illness is misunderstood as a spiritual problem.
It is perceived as a condition that brings disgrace to families and should be hidden.
Most families delay professional treatment until the situation becomes critical, or rather seek spiritual help.
Others struggle with the rehabilitation costs, availability and location of appropriate mental healthcare service providers.
Therefore, Minds Medica was established to fill this gap.
Minds Medica’s Holistic Approach to Treatments
From the beginning, the hospital positioned itself around outpatient care, inpatient care and addiction programmes, combining clinical treatment with psychological and social support.
Its approach also recognises that mental-health treatment is not limited to prescribing medication.
Patients may require assessment, therapy, structured rehabilitation, family involvement, continued monitoring and support as they return to everyday life.
The facility also promotes telehealth alongside conventional care, recognising that technology can help extend access to professional support.
It boasts advanced health equipment such as an electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) machine, among others.
Its addiction programme is similarly broader than the treatment of drug dependence alone.
It addresses substance and behavioural addictions, while its inpatient services provide structured care for people who require more intensive intervention.
This matters because addiction and mental health are not problems that disappear simply because people are told to stop.
They require professional assessment, treatment, patience and follow-up.
Why Minds Medica is a complement to healthcare service provision in Ondo state
Nigeria’s mental-health challenge is much bigger than the figures we see in the media.
The Nigerian Survey of Mental Health and Well-Being, one of the country’s major community-based studies, found that 12.1% of respondents had experienced at least one mental disorder during their lifetime, while about 5.8% had experienced a disorder within the preceding 12 months.
Even more concerning, among people whose disorders were seriously disabling, only about 8% had received treatment in the previous year, and the survey included Ondo among the eight states studied.
More recent estimates continue to show a substantial burden we can not overlook in the health sector. The Commonwealth Fund, drawing on international health data, reports that about 9.6% of Nigerians had a mental-health disorder in 2021.
Meanwhile, a recent review of Nigeria’s mental-health system estimates that only about 10-15% of people with mental disorders received professional care in 2024, leaving an estimated 85-90% without professional treatment.
There is also a serious shortage of specialists. Nigeria had an estimated 350 psychiatrists as of 2024, equivalent to about 0.16 psychiatrists per 100,000 people, against a WHO minimum reference of 1 per 100,000 used in the review.
So, when Dr Adeyeye spoke during the inauguration about the shortage of accessible mental-health services, particularly in Ondo State, he was addressing a genuine structural problem.
At the time of the commissioning, reports described the government-owned neuropsychiatric hospital in Akure as the only major facility available for such specialist care in the state, making the establishment of Minds Medica a significant addition to the state’s mental-health infrastructure.
There are also local indicators of the burden. Research examining records from a psychiatric facility in Ondo State recorded 13,834 inpatient and outpatient visits involving schizophrenia between 2010 and 2017, comprising 6,544 males and 7,290 females.
That figure does not represent the total number of people with mental illness in the state, but it illustrates that serious mental-health conditions have long required sustained clinical attention, not just in Ondo state, but in Nigeria at large.
Conclusion
WHO reported that, through its supported programmes in Nigeria, 74,525 people received treatment for mental-health conditions in 2023, compared with 22,131 in 2022.
Among those treated in 2023, psychotic disorders accounted for 24%, severe emotional disorders 9%, while epilepsy and seizure disorders accounted for 47% of the recorded conditions.
However, the national treatment gap remains substantial.
That is why the establishment of Minds Medica Specialist Hospital and Drug Rehabilitation Centre is critical at this period because the government can not carry the entire burden alone.
Minds Medica is a world-class specialist hospital that is pivotal in increasing the number of people with mental issues who receive professional treatments in Ondo state.
The founder has consistently described the project as a mission rather than simply a profit-driven health facility.
He has also spoken about establishing a Minds Medica Foundation to support indigent and neglected patients who may otherwise struggle to afford treatment.
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