UNIT:-1

NATIONAL MENTAL HEALTH POLICY

VIS A VIS NATIONAL HEALTH POLICY

JASLEEN KAUR
MSC(N)
 NATIONAL MENTAL HEALTH
POLICY
According to WHO, Mental health policies
describe the values, objectives & strategies of the
government to reduce the mental health burden
& to improve mental health.
They define a vision for the future that helps to
establish a blueprint for the prevention &
treatment of mental illness, the rehabilitation of
people with mental disorders, and the promotion
of mental health in the community.
Policies specify the standards that need to be
applied across all programs & services,
linking them all with a common vision,
objectives & purpose.
Without overall co-ordination, programs &
services are likely to be ineffective &
fragmented.
The first draft of national mental health
policy was prepared in late 2001 & came
into existence in 2003.
The NMHP will provide the necessary
conceptual framework for achieving goals.
The NMHP is being energetically
implemented, with adequate budgetary
support in the 10th five year plan,
 POLICY OBJECTIVES

The district mental health program (DMHP) is

redesigned around a nodal institution,where
most instances will be the zonal medical
college.
School mental health programs & dementia
care services may be gradually integrated
with DMHP.
Strengthening the medical college
psychiatry departments with a view to
develop psychiatric manpower, improve
psychiatric treatment facilities at
secondary level & to promote the
development of general psychiatric
hospitals in order to reduce & eventually
to eliminate, to a large extent the need
for big mental hospitals with all their
attendants infirmities.
Streamlining (to shape something) &
modernization of mental hospitals to
transform them from the present, mainly
custodial mode to tertiary care centers to
excellence with a dynamic social orientation
for providing leadership to research &
development (R & D) in the field of
community mental health.
Strengthening of central & state mental health
authorities in order that they may effectively
fulfil their role of monitoring ongoing mental
health programs, determining priorities at the
central/state level & promoting intersectoral
collaboration & linkages with national
programs.
Research & training aimed at building up an
extensive database of epidemiological
information relating to mental disorders &
their course/outcome, development of better
& most cost effective intervention methods,
promotion of intersectoral research &
providing the necessary inputs/conceptual
framework for health & policy planning.
Focused information education &
communication (IEC) activities with the active
collaboration of professional agencies such as
the Indian institute of Mass communication &
directed towards enhancing public awareness
& eradicating the stigma/discrimination
related to mental illness, will form an
important component of this policy objective..
 PRIORTIZED GOALS

TENTH FIVE YEAR PLAN (2002-2007)

1.District mental health program will be
extended to one district attached to each of
the 100 medical colleges in the country,
thereby covering 100 districts in the first
phase,& there after expanding to 100 districts
across the country.
 TENTH FIVE YEAR PLAN (2002-2007)

2. Strengthening of medical colleges with

allocation of Rs.50 lakhs each to medical
colleges, for upgrading departments of
psychiatry.
3.Streamlining & modernization of mental
hospitals with aims of reduction in chronicity
through intensive therapeutic intervention
using non-conventional anti-psychotic
medication, promoting care of chronically
mentally ill patients in the community using
outreach maintenance modalities.
 TENTH FIVE YEAR PLAN (2002-2007)

4. IEC (Information, education,

communication) training & research by
sponsoring relevant community based
research projects & building up an extensive
data base which will form basis for
development of models & policy planning.
 ELEVENTH FIVE YEAR PLAN (2002-
2007)
1. The DMHP will be extended to another lot
of 200 districts covered at the end of 10th
plan.
2. Qualitative as well as quantitative
improvement will be introduced in the
areas of research, training and IEC,with
more focused attention on epidemiological
catchment area surveys on a larger scale.
 ELEVENTH FIVE YEAR PLAN (2012-
2017)
1. The DMHP will be extended to remaining
previous plans will be consolidated, further
upgradation of the psychiatric departments
in medical colleges will be undertaken &
20 mental hospitals will be reconstructed.
2. IEC activities will be augmented to cover
all sections of the population across the
whole country.
 SPECIAL ISSUES

• Senior citizens suffering from severely

disabling diseases such as alzheimer’s
disease,& other types of dementia,
Parkinson's disease, depression of late onset
& other psychogeriatric disorders.
• Victims of child sexual abuse, marital/domestic
violence, dowry related ill treatment, rape &
incest.

• Children & adolescents affected by problems of

maladjustments or other scholastic problems,
depression/psychosis of early onset, attention
deficit hyper activity from failure in
examination or other environmental stressors.
• Victims of poverty, destitution & abandonment,
such as women thrown out of the marital
home or old & infirm parents left to friend for
themselves.
• Victims of natural or man-made disasters such
as
cyclones,earthquakes,famines,war,terrorism,co
mmunal/ethnic strike,with specail attention to
the specific needs of children orphaned by
such disasters.
 NATIONAL HEALTH
POLICY
• NHP was formulated in 1983 & revised in
2002.
 OBJECTIVES

The main objective of NHP-2002 is to achieve

an acceptable standard of good health
amongst the general population in the
country.
The approach would be to increase access to
the decentralized public health system by
establishing new infrastructure in deficient
areas & by upgrading the infrastructure in
the existing institutions.
 SPECIFIC
RECOMMENDATIONS WITH
REGARD TO MENTAL
HEALTH
• Upgrading infrastructure of institutions at
central government expense so as to secure
the human rights of this vulnerable
segment of society.
• Envisages (imagine) a network of
decentralized mental health services for
ameliorating the more common categories
of disorders.
 SPECIFIC DISCUSSSION
REGARDING MENTAL
HEALTH
 Mental health disorders are actually much
more prevalent than is apparent on the
surface.
 While such disorders do not contribute
significantly to mortality, they have serious
bearing on the quality of life of the affected
persons & their families.
 Sometimes, based on religious faith, mental
disorders are treated as spiritual affliction.
 This had led to the establishment of
unlicensed mental institutions as an
adjunct to religious institutions where
reliance is placed on faith cure.
 Serious conditions of mental disorder
require hospitalization & treatment under
trained supervision.
 Mental health institutions was woefully
deficient in physical infrastructure &
trained manpower.
 NHP-2002 will address itself to these
deficiencies in the public health sector.
THANK
YOU