Mental hospital scripts 387 happy endings in Gujarat

The government mental hospital in the city has been instrumental in scripting many happy endings for mentally ill patients. The hospital has managed to reunite close to 400 mentally ill patients with their families since it started functioning in 2003.

Since the hospital commenced its activities, it has received close to 600 new patients and of these, reunited 387 with their families. Interestingly, social workers and psychiatrists working at the hospital say they have to go to great lengths to help unite the mentally ill patients with their families.

"When we get mentally ill patients who have been roaming the streets most of the time, their cognitive abilities are affected. It takes a long time before they can tell us something about themselves. Many times we have no way of verifying their claims," said Dr Ajay Chauhan, superintendent of Mental Hospital, Shahibaug.

Chauhan said that he has seen an interesting trend of increase in number of out-of-state patients coming to the centre. "With improvement of long distance train connectivity, the number of such patients at our hospital has also increased. In fact, in the last few years, over 50% of our patients originally belong to states other than Gujarat," said Chauhan. It should be noted that mentally ill patients roaming the city are reported to the hospital, and several of them are from outside the state.

He also said that most out-of-state patients belong to poorer states like Bihar, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh. "Often poverty forces relatives of such patients to abandon them," said Chauhan, and added that the hospital also provides occupational therapy to help in their rehabilitation.

Psychiatric social worker Daksh Bhatt said that they have often been to a place with nothing more than the person's name. "At times the patient just remembers the name of his/her village, and in absence of other detail, we go with them to their village. Familiarity at times triggers memory and at times villagers recognise them and lead us to their family," said Bhatt.