Psychiatry and Society

How do we define creativity? Creativity is the ability of individuals to develop novel and useful products. Novelty, originality, innovation, ingenuity are some of the words often used to define creativity. But originality is just one component of creativity. There is another essential aspect of creativity – the idea should be effective, useful or productive.  Creativity exists in many domains and is not just limited to the arts, as most people seem to think. Creativity is at work behind most scientific inventions, innovative gadgets, health technologies and economic theories which have changed the world. Individuals differ in their propensity and capacity to be creative. Many of us are creative in small ways - in ways we find solutions to problems of everyday life. Only a few are highly creative and leave their mark on the world. What does it take to be creative? Creative individuals tend to possess some qualities or traits that may contribute to or are associa...

Checklists and psychological screening questionnaires for mental illness are effective, easy to use and widely available. Pune was shocked into considering the need for mental health screening of its bus drivers after one of them wilfully killed eight people and injured 32 others. He hijacked a bus at the depot and mowed down victims in broad daylight. Amidst the protests, and outrage the Pune administration has decided that all its bus driver undergo psychological testing. We have already looked at screening of police personnel for mental health problems , and also screening of teenagers for alcohol and drug abuse . Here we specifically examine the feasibility of regularly screening the 8600 PMPL staff and Pune bus drivers for mental health problems. Mental illness in bus drivers Mental health problems are higher for bus drivers who suffer from back pain, are dissatisfied with their jobs or undertake long-distance driving. This is more so for employees who have worked fo...

Recovery to meaningful functioning after even severe mental illness is the present standard of care in mental health treatment. Recovery is made possible by medications that are now widely available at a reasonable cost. Planning and persistence with treatment need to be ensured to achieve a quality recovery. Recovery from mental disorders is a process of change through which individuals improve their health and wellness live a self-directed life strive to reach their full potential The road to recovery from mental illness has four components that together give meaning to life. 1. Health Overcoming or managing the disease and living in a physically and emotionally healthy way. Start with the basics - medication, meals, sleep and exercise . Establishing routines for these basic health tasks are essential for recovery of function. Medication is the corner stone on which recovery is nurtured. In the absence of medication frequent relapses and recurrences disrupt basic f...

A family tragedy was played out through a small article in the Pune news . In a fit of rage a mentally ill woman set her daughter alight while she was asleep. The narrative was short and the item tucked into one of the inner pages under a largish headline.  This was the reason - the why - mental illness     A glib explanation for a horrific event lays the entire burden of its causation at the doors of a mental health disorder. The World Health Organisation  (WHO) has estimated that one in four persons  will have a mental health disorder at some stage of life . Violence is rarely a manifestation of mental illness In this rare cause of burning (mental illness), the burning of her daughter is an indicator of the severity of the mother's mental illness. Yet society, of which this news item is a barometer, has unquestioningly accepted mental illness as a sufficient cause. In a nation with about 0.48 mental health workers of any kind  for every 100...