A patient lies on a bed biting hard on something in a room lit in red. After securing the hands and legs of the patient with straps someone pulls down a lever and the patient wriggles in pain. This image of the Electro Convulsive Therapy (ECT) projected in many Indian movies has done much harm to the mental health care sector than any other images on psychiatric ailments.
“In the movies it looks like a cruel deed and that the patient would suffer a lot during the process. In fact it is just 7 volts of electricity administered under general anaesthesia,” said Jayanthi M.R, Associate Professor of Nursing at Government Nursing College, Kozhikode, adding that many people refuse ECT based on the images projected in films.
There are several such myths associated with mental health care, and movies often have a role in creating wrong public perception about treatment. An exhibition on mental health treatment organised by the students of the Government Nursing College, Kozhikode at the Government Mental Health Centre here on Saturday was meant to dispel such misunderstandings.
Need for treatment
The exhibition was put together by the final year B.Sc. (Nursing) students. They explained the functioning of the brain through charts and stressed the need for proper treatment for mental health ailments through a five-minute skit. Videos were shown featuring methods in which a violent patient could be controlled physically.
A hallucination box has been set up to make people understand how a person who hallucinated felt. Several types of mental health problems have been explained in layman’s terms along with how they could be treated.
Screening of films based on mental health as themes was the star attraction of the event. “The movies”, Ms.Jayanthi said, “did not always project the mental health problems in a bad light”. Malayalam films Bhoothakkannadi ’ and Thanmatra accurately depicted delusion and dementia. The English movie A Beautiful Mind gives an accurate portrayal of schizophrenia, she added.
Assistant Professor in Psychiatric Nursing T.K. Salim was the coordinator of the event.
