MANSEHRA: The General and Mental Hospital, Dadar, has become the first health facility in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to launch the telepsychiatry programme to the benefit of mental patients in the region.

The programme will help local doctors consult psychiatrists in the Aga Khan Hospital Karachi online about the treatment of their patients.

The Medibank, a nationwide charity providing patients with free medicines, will operate the facility with the financial assistance of a US-based Pakistani doctor.

Deputy commissioners Iqbal Hussain of Mansehra and Ammara Khattak of Abbottabad jointly inaugurated the programme. Medical superintendent of the hospital Dr Mohammad Naseer Tipu, former MS Dr Mohammad Naeem Awan and philanthropist Shiraz Mehmood Qureshi also spoke on the occasion. Dr Tipu said psychiatric patients would get better consultation and treatment at the hospital after the launch of the telepsychiatry programme.

Former MS Dr Awan, who relinquished the office of late, said the hospital had no psychiatrist for many years to the misery of patients in the region and adjoining areas.

He said the start of the telepsychiatry programme would help assuage the suffering of visitors.

Dr Awan said there were only two mental hospitals in KP, one in Peshawar and the other in Dodial.

He said though there was an influx of mental patients, the Dodial) hospital didn’t have psychiatrists to their misery.

The former MS said the hospital, which had five wards with 20 beds each for psychiatric patients, was destroyed in the 2005 earthquake but it had yet to be reconstructed.

He however said the best possible care was provided to visitors in some cracked buildings.

The Mansehra deputy commissioner said the government accorded healthcare a top priority and therefore, hospitals and health facilities were being upgraded across the province to improve healthcare.

The Abbottabad deputy commissioner said taking care of the mentally-challenged people was the collective responsibly of the government and society. She praised the Medibank for its initiatives benefiting the poor people in Abbottabad, Mansehra and other parts of Hazara division. On the occasion, psychiatrist Dr Sameeha Aleem examined patients online from her city, prescribed them medicines, and answered their questions.

OATH ADMINISTERED: Balakot assistant commissioner Roman Barhanan on Saturday administered the oath to eleven newly-elected local councillors on Saturday.

The councillors, including men and women, were elected in the recent by-elections. The assistant commissioner said for the first time in the province’s history, a large number of women councillors were elected to village and neighbourhood, tehsil and district councils.

“In think the village and neighbourhood councils, which are nonpolitical in nature, will provide both men and women councillors with the opportunity to serve the people at grassroots level,” he said. The councillors said they would serve the people sincerely.

Published in Dawn, April 3rd, 2016