Lanka lacks adequate mental health specialists

Chesmal Siriwardhana

COLOMBO: Sri Lanka has only 14 mental health specialists to serve a population of 19 million, said Healthcare and Nutrition Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva. He was speaking at a ceremony to mark the World Mental Health Day.

The ceremony was organised by the Mental Health Services Director's Office of the Health Ministry and held at the Health Education Bureau (HEB) auditorium, Colombo.

Minister Nimal Siripala de Silva pointed out that Sri Lanka has an estimated number of 376,000 mental health patients. He said there is a mentally sick person in every family out of four families in Sri Lanka and that this number is growing each year.

According to the Minister, the Government is facing a huge problem in delivering necessary healthcare to these patients due to the lack of qualified specialist doctors. He said the existing medical education system in the country is to be blamed for this problem.

The doctors and the Post Graduate Institute of Medicine (PGIM) of Sri Lanka have the right to take decisions on postgraduate medical education and which subjects to specialise on. This makes doctors go into more lucrative fields in medicine and few doctors specialise in fields like forensic medicine and psychiatry, the Minister said. Some doctors who are sent abroad to specialise in mental health do not return to Sri Lanka after completion of their studies, the Minister said.

He said the reason for this is they are paid very well in European countries who also lack mental health specialists.

Government has tried to solve this problem by initiating a mental health diploma course for doctors to enable them to specialise in mental health. The Minister said although the Health Ministry has held discussions with PGIM regarding this issues over 20 times, a final result is yet to be obtained due to the unwillingness of the PGIM. The PGIM seems reluctant to start this programme due to some reason, the Minister said.

The existing mental health specialists in Sri Lanka have also shown little interest in implementing this initiative due to the fact that they stand to lose their monopoly in the field, Minister de Silva said. The Government has taken a firm decision to rectify this problem. In the future, Health Ministry will decide fields of specialisation for doctors.

The PGIM or the GMOA or anyone else cannot take these decisions, the Minister emphasised. He said by taking this path, the Government would be able to provide a balanced professional service to the public.

The Minister said non-violent mental health patients will be treated at their homes at Government expense in the future.

Also steps will be taken to improve mental health knowledge of the public, he said.