[ad_1]
After years of delays, the state government has given its approval to start 16 stage homes for mentally ill patients in four regional mental health hospitals in Maharashtra. Not only will these new homes help patients reintegrate into society, but they will also provide them with vocational training to be economically self-sufficient after discharge – giving a glimmer of hope to the hundreds of patients who have been abandoned.
The state government’s decision to relocate homeless and mentally ill patients follows a Supreme Court directive in 2017 that ordered all states and union territories to create rehab homes for abandoned, homeless, and healed patients — those who did not need hospital treatment. States were required to comply within a year.
It was the result of a court petition Gaurav Kumar Bansal filed in the Supreme Court in 2016 raising concerns about the need to set up rehabilitation homes for people with mental illnesses.
Speaking to The Indian Express Bansal, he said, “Many states have already started implementing the directives. Just to relieve congestion in hospitals, abandoned patients can be given and treated to nursing homes, they need rehabilitation.”
All of these homes will also have medical personnel to take care of patients and ensure that prescribed medications are consumed. In case of a medical emergency, patients will be taken to nearby medical hospitals.
Halfway homes are temporary housing centers for people recovering from mental illness – although they do not need the full services of hospitals but are not yet ready to live independently on their own. After years of confinement within the walls of hospitals, the homes provide a gateway to enhance their ability to live independently or communally.
“When a patient is on the road to recovery, they develop better when they move to another resident. They learn and develop social skills. This helps them adjust better in a new environment when they are discharged from hospitals,” said Dr. Swapnil Lael, Additional Director of Health Services at Maharashtra.
The provision of Rs 5.76 crore has been approved by the state. This will be done in collaboration with the Department of Social Justice and Public Health. The NGOs running these homes will get Rs 1,200 per patient on a monthly basis.
These homes will have career coaches, psychologists, and social workers. Doctors believe that the introduction of more halfway houses could help remove the stigma around asylums.
We will provide vocational trainings such as sewing, furniture making, computer programming, IT courses, and more. This will make the patients economically independent when they are discharged from the hospitals. They will not have to beg or steal to survive. “They can also lead a normal life like other people,” said Dr. Lal.
As reported by The Indian Express on February 1, between January 2016 and September 2021, a total of 5,877 mentally ill patients were abandoned by their relatives in four regional mental hospitals – Pune, Thane, Raigad and Nagpur. Nagpur with 3829 such patients accounting for almost 60 per cent of these patients who were given up, followed by Ratnagiri (1674), Pune (361) and Thane (13).
For example, the police rescued a 32-year-old woman from a railway station and after evaluation, she was sent to a mental health hospital in Nagpur when she was diagnosed with a personality disorder in 2017. After four years of treatment, she recovered and gave her home address to social workers. in the hospital. But when contacted, her family in Gadchiroli refused to accept her. She is one of those patients who are abandoned by their families due to stigma even after recovery. But now that new homes are starting to roll in, you want to enroll in a letting go sewing skill course.
[ad_2]
