Mental Disorder in Sri Lanka

By M.R.S. Silva

This essay attempts to deal with few areas relating to mental disorder, namely (a) what is mental disorder? (b) How it becomes global phenomena? and (c) the trend of mental disorder in Sri Lanka.

Mental illness refers to a wide range of mental health conditions — disorders that affect your mood, thinking and behavior. Examples of mental illness include depression, anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, eating disorders and addictive behaviors.

Many people have mental health concerns from time to time. But a mental health concern becomes a mental illness when ongoing signs and symptoms cause frequent stress and affect your ability to function.

Signs and symptoms of mental illness can vary, depending on the particular disorder, circumstances and other factors. Mental illness symptoms can affect emotions, thoughts and behaviors.

Examples of signs and symptoms include; feeling sad or down, confused thinking or reduced ability to concentrate , excessive fears or worries , withdrawal from friends and activities , significant tiredness , low energy or problems of sleeping, inability to cope with daily problems, trouble understanding and relating to situations and to people , drug abuse , excessive anger, hostility or violence and suicidal thinking.

Most mental illnesses don't improve on their own, and if untreated, a mental illness may get worse over time and cause serious problems.

If your loved one shows signs of mental illness, have an open and honest discussion with him or her about your concerns. You may not be able to force someone to get professional care, but you can offer encouragement and support. You can also help your loved one find a qualified mental health provider and make an appointment. You may even be able to go along to the appointment.

In Sri Lanka, we can see many mental ill health conditions due to several factors. Those factors can be identified as economic and non-economic (i.e. socio economic) factors. The committed suicide is the final stage of the mental disorder.

Firstly, we can give direct attention for the people who are in mental disorder and why they are in mental disorder? Even small children are suffering from this, due to lack of their parental love and caring, overload of academic actives etc. Especially school children do not get their parent’s affection because their parents also engage in their jobs. Due to job conscious of the parents they do not give really attention for their children. The school children will fed up and feel loneliness. Therefore they will have some mental depression. Finally it will affect for their lack of happiness and to their school education. They feel they should not live more. So they try to kill themselves. At the end it will be a tragedy.

Now let’s looks for the adults’ mental disorder. Due to several factors they suffered from this. We can identify those as stressful life situations, such as financial problems; a loved one's death or a divorce; a chronic medical condition, such as cancer; brain damage as a result of a serious injury (traumatic brain injury), such as a violent blow to the head; traumatic experiences, such as military combat or being assaulted; use of illegal drugs; being abused or neglected as a child and having few friends or few healthy relationships.

One in ten people suffer from some type of mental illness in Sri Lanka according to the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH).That is mental illness strikes one in ten Lankans. The study also had found that the causes for mental illness in Sri Lanka were both varied and complex. The most professionals believe that the 30-year conflict and the 2004 tsunami were among the more significant events that had been the causes for mental health issues in Sri Lanka.

According to national mental health data, two in every 100 people in Sri Lanka will experience a serious mental illness such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. However mental problems can be treated so and that people can recover from them in full and hopefully lead normal lives, officials said. Nearly 80% of these patients, once treated, will go on to make a full recovery they said, although social stigma was one of the biggest barriers faced by such persons. The stigma faced by mental patients can make it awfully difficult for them to motivate themselves to get better. Everyone has a role to play to end discrimination against mentally ill people, they said.

Major mental illnesses such as schizophrenia, depression and bipolar disorder require medication to restore the imbalance of chemical substances in the brain that cause them, officials said. Treatment for mental health problems in Sri Lanka is increasingly changing and people now have more access to health care facilities. People also have access to medical care as out-patients from their local clinic or hospital, they said

Common mental disorder should be looked with other diseases associated with poverty, treatment and prevention of mental diseases should involve confronting poverty and economic development apart from the medical interventions.

This is one of Global Barden of disease in developing countries. Low level of educations, specific association with income levels, experience of insecurity and hopelessness rapid social change, risk of violence and physical ill-health may explain the great vulnerability of the poor to common mental disorder. The direct and indirect costs of mental ill-health worsen the economic condition, setting up a vicious cycle of poverty and mental disorder.

Poverty including low income, lack of material possessions, lack of employment and housing difficulties. (i.e. poor living conditions) Not only poverty but also socioeconomic problems have been acted as one of the most important factors causing emotional distress.

Poor people stress the anxiety and fear they experience because they feel insecure and vulnerable when their conditions worsen. The suicide of farmers provides another illustration of the impact of financial insecurity on mental disorder. Poverty, unemployment and underemployment are widespread. In rural areas, 25 percent of the population is living below poverty level. The poverty rate in some rural districts is over 50 percent. More than two thirds of people in rural provinces have no access to electricity and half have no access to safe water or hygienic toilet facilities. These terrible conditions create enormous social pressures that find their tragic expression in the continuing cases of suicide. According to Sri Lankan health ministry figures, the suicide rate is higher in rural areas. The overall suicide rate per 100,000 populations in paddy rice growing districts was 35.91.

Globalization and the advent of multinational companies have led to new completion for small scale farmers whose goods are no longer competitively priced and other problems such as difficult to common mental disorders to factors such as discriminations, unemployment and living throng a period of social change.

Major economic losses for individuals, increased costs of health care, weakened family ties may be expected to lead to rising suicide rates in Sri Lanka.

Loneliness

Development was rated according to attributes such as means of subsistence, education, community cooperation and participation and transportation.

When our need for social relationships is not met, we fall apart mentally and even physically. There are effects on the brain and on the body. Some effects work subtly, through the exposure of multiple body systems to excess amounts of stress hormones. Yet the effects are distinct enough to be measured over time, so that unmet social needs take a serious toll on health, eroding our arteries, creating high blood pressure, and even undermining learning and memory.

A lack of close friends and a dearth of broader social contact generally bring the emotional discomfort or distress known as loneliness. It begins with an awareness of a deficiency of relationships. This cognitive awareness plays through our brain with an emotional soundtrack. It makes us sad. We might feel emptiness. We may be filled with a longing for contact. We feel isolated, distanced from others, deprived. These feelings tear away at our emotional well-being.

Despite the negative effects of loneliness, it can hardly be considered abnormal. It is a most normal feeling. Everyone feels lonely sometimes—after a break-up with a friend or lover, when we move to a new place, when we are excluded from some social gathering.

Gender

Sex differences is risks for common mental disorders in all societies (mail dominance)

For an example woman bear the brunt of the adversities associated with poverty, less access to school, physical abuse from her husband, forced marriage from their parents, sexual trafficking, fewer job opportunities, and limitation of their participation in activities outside the home. Find out lack of support from the bank and the government.

Hope / essences

This is the one of psychological phenomena especially women feel the bad when their husband migration to urban areas for employment.

 As an example, some people who have been recruited to the government sector without concerning what they desire. Then they automatically feel dissatisfaction. This led to more people be mentally problems. The government started to recruits many graduates who had studied different area to the government sector. As an example, some graduates who received degree in some certain area, but now they work for entire different area.

These findings suggest that the association between poverty and common mental disorders is a universal one, occurring in all societies irrespective of their levels of development. According to Sri Lankan situation, this must be cured before let it to be worsen. Because it will affect for the economic development in Sri Lanka. This is one of biggest issue which government must take necessary action for solve this issue. Entire society must aware of this situation. Otherwise Sri Lanka will experience same economic condition during 2050.