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Mental patients complain...
2006-08-28 08:32:35
By Gerald Kitabu
Despite an upsurge in the number of mental patients, the problem still receives little attention from policymakers, the government and its development partners, The Guardian can report.
At present, six wards in Ilala Municipal in Dar es Salaam account for 362 known mental cases in the city.
However, the number could be higher as it is feared that some patients are hidden by their kin.
It has been established that supply of medicines to mental patients has been compromised by budgetary constraints in the Ministry of Health.
Investigations conducted in Dar es Salaam have revealed that mental illness patients receive half-doses or go without the medicines, where they cannot pay for them.
Scola Shonde, a mental patient who lives in Ilala told The Guardian that she had not received medicine for many weeks as prescribed by her doctor. She is now forced to buy them.
’In the past few months, I have been told to buy the drugs because the hospital has no drugs,’ she said.
Scola who hails from Mbozi in Mbeya Region said she resolved to travel to the city after experiencing a similar problem in Mbeya.
’When I went to hospital, they used to give me insufficient haloperidol, pheobarbitone, phenytoine and amitriptine, which they said cured epilepsy. However, drugs were too expensive to buy,’ she said.
She said that to get such drugs she had to beg money from Good Samaritans. Scola is currently attending clinics at the Muhimbili National Hospital.
A family of a mental patient in Mwananyamala said they were forced to buy drugs, after failing to get them at government hospitals.
’Our patient has been taking drugs without getting relief. This is because she did not get full dose due to lack of money. Once she started getting free treatment at Mwanayamala Hospital, she improved within a short time,’ the patient’s minder said.
Interviewed, a non-governmental organization Basic Needs that cares for mental patients said the shortage of drugs in government hospitals is a daily problem that risks the lives of many people.
’During consultative meetings with mentally ill people, we learnt that most of them did not get drugs at all and if given, it was half dose,’ said Tobias Chelechele, a mental health coordinator with Basic Needs.
’From January to June this year, when our six pilot wards started work, we have identified 362 mentally ill people and we think there are sill many more,’ he said.
He named the six wards reached as Chamazi, Temeke, Kimara, Mwananyamala, Kinyerezi and Ilala.
’If only six wards in Dar es Salaam Region have 362 people out of them 281 are epileptic including 105 children, can you imagine the number of mentally ill people in the country? he wondered.
According to World Health Organisation (WHO) 2001 report, one per cent of any given population has metal problems.
Alfonsina Massawe, 53, the chairperson of Family Care Foundation in Ilala that cares for poor children, including the mentally ill people, said the problem of mentally ill people was on the increase.
’I receive frequent complaints from mental patients that they are sometimes given under-doses,’ said Massawe, whose foundation cares for 14 mentally sick people.
She said some patients only started getting the drugs after her foundation made follow-ups at hospitals.
Reached for comment, the communication officer at the Ministry of Health Nsachris Mwamwaja said, We don’t deal with hospitals directly.
The ministry’s task is to make policies and enforce directives.
Issues pertaining to hospitals fall under regional administrative secretary.
City medical officer Deogratius Mutasiwa said so far he had not received any complaints and promised to communicate with municipal mental health coordinators to find out if there were such complaints.
The efforts to get comments from the municipal mental health coordinators did not yield fruit because of bureaucracy.
’’Our municipalities have protocols. You have to write down your questions first.
We will go through them before taking them to the Municipal Doctor who in turn will take it to the city medical officer.
From the city medical officer, they will be taken to the director and if he approves, then, you will collect them for publishing” said one of the municipal mental health coordinator.
According to reliable sources, Tanzania has only 12 qualified psychiatrists for its 40 million population.
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