Stigma towards mental illness keeps patients away from expert help

Srinagar: Even though general beliefs vis-à-vis mental illness are changing steadily, there is still popular fear of social stigmatization associated with it, which forces people to their psychiatric problems under wraps.

So in a bid to conceal their mental conditions, a good number of patients in need of psychiatric help prefer to visit general physicians – and of course, faith-healers or ‘Pirs’ too!

A woman visiting the Srinagar’s Psychiatric Diseases Hospital, says even though the hospital is now called Psychiatric hospital and not Mental hospital, “it has not made much difference in the attitude of the people.

“I remember when one of my relatives saw my medical card from the Psychiatric hospital, he thought I was mad. Until then only my husband’s family knew I was visiting the hospital for treatment, but afterwards everyone in the extended family started looked at me differently; and this is very disconcerting,” she said.

“Though doctors tell me that my problem is not grave and that I will have to come to the hospital for regular check-ups, but the situation is different now. The word has spread about my illness and some of my relatives don’t allow their children to come close to me,” she said.

In Kashmir, doctors believe no more than 10 percent of those in need of psychiatric help are actually approaching the hospital. They say people prefer to take such patients to physicians rather than to psychiatrists.

Dr. Arshad Hussain, a psychiatrist at the Government Psychiatric Hospital, believes that the stigma related to mental illness is declining but not to the extent where it could make some visible difference.

“When the hospital was started, it was sort of a jail and that was the dreaded part. Even though it was changed to a hospital now, but it still has the stigma attached with it,” Dr. Hussain says.

“Recently we did a survey and found out that the maximum people suffering from psychiatric problems are not approaching the relevant doctors,” he revealed.

Commenting on peoples’ tendency of approaching faith-healers in such cases, Dr. Hussain said, “Taking patients to the faith-healers is part of the culture. The only thing which we have to do is to differentiate between the faith-healers from the fake-healers. We have to isolate the fake-healers and include the faith-healers in the greater care system.”

He says faith being vital part of the mental health, can help people to overcome illness.

“The only way to get rid of the stigma related to the disease is to make the mental health available, accessible and acceptable to all. Mental health sections should be associated with all general hospitals. Now we have this facility in SMHS hospital and that has helped reduce the stigma associated with the disease,” he said.

As per a research study conducted by Department of Sociology, University of Kashmir, titled “Attitude towards mental illness in Kashmir”, a huge number of people in the Valley do not go to the psychiatrists for treatment.

The study reveals that 23.66 percent respondents did not take any psychiatric treatment because of the stigma attached to it.

An in-depth discussion with the respondents revealed that they hesitated to seek psychiatric treatment because of fear of being labelled as “imbalanced and crazy”.

Study says patients’ poor self-perception is also a reason for their shying away from seeking psychiatric help.

Dr. Aadil Bashir, Assistant Professor at the Department of Social Work, agrees that there is a huge stigma attached with the mental illness in Kashmir.

“A social stigma has emerged in our society which is very unfortunate. If a person visits the psychiatric hospital, he/she is declared unfit by the society. Instead of offering support, help, counseling, the society is adding more to the trauma of the such patients,” he says.

He suggests that community-based mental health system is the best system which can help in removing this stigma from the society. So this, he says mental health clinics should be established at district levels.

It is noteworthy that the conflict situation has adversely affected the mental health of people in Kashmir, resulting in the significant increase in the psychological disorders.

As per the records in the Psychiatric Diseases Hospital, more than 100,000 people visited the hospital in 2015 alone.

Source:http://dailykashmirimages.com/Details/111418/stigma-towards-mental-illne...