Our Story
The Beginning
In year 2020, when COVID-19 pandemic was at its peak, one of the co-founder of OkayMinds Dr. Nimisha Vandan was conducting research on Impact of COVID-19 on different subsets of population living in Hong Kong. She found that regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, race, income, education majority of the population was suffering from a silent pandemic that was Mental Health concerns and there was almost no help available. She shared her concern with other two friends Dr. Amit Wanchoo and Mr. Ameesh Kumar and together they thought about helping people online and founded OkayMinds. They started to conduct workshops to teach simple tips and techniques to deal with stress, anxiety and fear over zoom as a service to the community. First online workshop was conducted for the Foreign Domestic Workers living in Hong Kong.
Vision
Make Mental Health a Priority for Everyone.
Mission
At OkayMinds, we empower individuals and communities to bring mental health at forefront by prioritizing to deal with emotional and social concerns, needs, and challenges using different approaches. By learning and utilizing OkayMinds approaches people will achieve their full potential both at personal and professional life resulting in, better work-life balance, meaningful relationships and higher productivity.
The TEAM
Dr Nimisha Vandan, Co-founder & Director
Dr. Nimisha Vandan, is a former Post-Doctoral Fellow of the School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong. She was part of a global research team that is researching the impact of Covid-19 on public health in Canada, UK, China, and Hong Kong.
She completed her PhD on Patients’ experience with Hong Kong healthcare system from The University of Hong Kong. She has completed her master’s in international health from The University of Tokyo, Japan and has published several research papers and articles in various International peer-reviewed journals.
She is certified to conduct Mental Health First Aid and carries certification in Mental Health Literacy. Nimisha has conducted multiple mental health awareness workshops focusing on mental illness, stress management, positive relationships building etc. in Hong Kong and India. She has been a guest speaker and panellist in various forums and conferences focussing on Health Equity and Mental Health.
Nimisha is a receiver of Post Graduate Scholarship and University Postgraduate Fellowship (2015-2019) awards from The University of Hong Kong. She believes that “we all have role in maintaining, enhancing and supporting mental health for ourselves, friends, colleagues and family.
Dr Amit Wanchoo, Co-founder
Trained as a medical doctor, Dr. Wanchoo has been actively organizing and engaging in various mental health programs. He is the CEO of SPACE COMMUNICATIONS, 1st Event
Management Company of Jammu and Kashmir, India. He is also the director of EATON LABORATORIES which is the first pharmaceutical manufacturing unit of Kashmir (India) actively involved in low cost healthcare. Dr. Wanchoo has blended health and entertainment in
healing and supporting mental health initiatives for people in Kashmir and other parts of India and has conducted innumerable mental health workshops in a span of last ten years for various
institutions.
He has utilized medicine, art and culture as an effective tool for generating mental well-being and has been involved in conducting and organizing various workshops on PTSD, mental
disorders and various other related fields. He has also worked with Medicine sans Frontiers in Kashmir (India) and was one of the first to be part of their initial workshops for mental health training in Conflict zones. He has been focused on better mental health, skill building and job
creation as modes of positive change. He has travelled widely around the Globe and has been fellow at leading schools and universities of the world including Yale, Harvard Kennedy School,
London School of Economics, and Asia Global Institute at The University of Hong Kong.