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Today's Paper | June 16, 2024

Published 21 Jul, 2005 12:00am

Causes behind psychiatric disorders discussed

PESHAWAR, July 20: Psychiatrists have cited conflicts between old and new cultural values, economic and social compulsions, transformation of society, urbanization and disintegration of the family system as the main reasons behind psychiatric ailments. “It is high time that we reconsider our priorities in the light of the new developments and adopt ourselves to the new environment accordingly so as to keep a host of psychiatric diseases at bay,” said Psychiatrist Dr Mian Iftikhar Hussain.

Dr Iftikhar was addressing patients and community elders at a free medical camp organized by the Health Promotion Welfare Society at Chakdara in Dir district on Wednesday.

Disintegration of the family system has been one of the major causes of rise in psychiatric ailments because there is no social or official support for the people who are cut off from their families.

Citing the WHO’s statistics for the year 2001, he said that six of the top 10 diseases in the world were related to psychiatry, saying that honour killings and the prevailing violence in the society were the result of the disintegration of the family system and new emerging norms and values at the cost of the old ones.

Dr Iftikhar said that every 10th person in developing countries was afflicted with some sort of mental ailment that could be done away with timely treatment and steps to eliminate the causative agents.

Dr Tayyeb Tahir, another psychiatrist, opined that doctors must take into account the prevalent socio-economic factors while examining patients.

He said that most of the times psychiatric ailments could be cured through counselling for which doctors were required to record the complete history of patients.

Dr Nusrat Begum said that womenfolk happened to be the worst affected by mental ailments owing to the male-dominated society of the country.

She said that the majority of women suffered from anxiety, depression, mental retardation, drug addiction, schizophrenia and epilepsy.

She said that most patients discontinue their treatment halfway that affected them adversely, and added that the patients should continue their treatment for a stipulated period.

Dr Nusrat said that patients suffering from psychiatric ailments were looked down upon by their families that further aggravated their condition.

She said that apart from consulting the right doctor at the right time, the patients needed complete support of their families as far as their full treatment was concerned.

Established in July 2003, the Health Promotion Welfare Society, with the help of 30 staff members, including three female psychiatrists, Dr Nusrat said was extending free curative facilities for psychiatric disorders, rehabilitation and occupational therapy, detoxification and management for various drugs dependence, counselling for HIV/Aids, prevention and pre- and post-test counselling and follow-up and management, besides vaccination and immunization against various diseases, maternal and child health, nutrition of women and children.

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