Mental Health and Social Well-being is a Division within the Office of Inclusion and Belonging [Pró-Reitoria de Inclusão e Pertencimento](PRIP) that focuses on developing initiatives related to social interaction, social well-being, and mental health within the campus community. The Division aims to achieve the following objectives:

1. Preventing distress, offering guidance, and providing initial support to both degree-seeking students and exchange students, faculty, and staff members at USP.
2. Offering emotional support to individuals within the USP community from an intersectional perspective, highlighting the transcultural aspect of care and the significance of knowledge derived from diverse national and international cultures.
3. Promoting mental health through active listening, educational programs, fostering social connections, and providing institutional support, through collaboration with healthcare networks, assistance services, and support groups addressing a wide range of emotional, cultural, political, and legal matters both within and outside the university.

ECOS (Listening, Care, and Guidance in Mental Health) [Escuta, Cuidado e Orientação em Saúde Mental] is a mental health program aimed at the USP Community with multiple areas of action.

ECOS has a service space located on the Butantã Campus. It offers in-person and spontaneous listening sessions without the need for appointments, providing reflection and potential referrals to care networks both internal and external to USP. The listening sessions are conducted by the ECOS team, which comprises healthcare professionals and scholarship recipient students from diverse fields of knowledge, who are engaged in undergraduate research projects. The program does not handle emergencies. For acute mental health crises, it is advised to seek a Psychiatric Emergency Room [Pronto Socorro Psiquiátrico] (the reference for the Butantã Campus is Pronto Socorro Lapa [Emergency Room Lapa], Av. Queiroz Filho, 313; phone: (11) 4878-1701).

The ECOS Program continuously coordinates a mental health care network based on the USP campuses, mobilizing actions and university services, the Sistema Único de Saúde [Unified Health System] (SUS), other public and social policies. The aim is to ensure access to these resources for the university community and provide a Mental Health Map of USP.

The ECOS team provides institutional support to different groups, units and campuses of USP. This support includes the creation of actions and services related to mental health, as well as the qualification of existing initiatives. In this way, the program responds to collective demands, seeking to enhance local actions and promote the participation of the relevant communities in promoting mental health in everywhere.

For additional details about the ECOS Program and contact options, please refer to the program’s website.