Medical officers, staff nurses trained in talking to women about postpartum depression

NHM, Tamil Nadu trains medical officers and staff nurses to address postpartum depression at primary healthcare level.

In an initiative towards training people to take up mental healthcare at the primary healthcare level, the National Health Mission (NHM), Tamil Nadu has trained medical officers and staff nurses at delivery points, such as Comprehensive Emergency Obstetric and Newborn Care (CEmONC) centres, to reach out to women on postpartum depression, Shilpa Prabhakar Satish, Mission Director, NHM - TN, said.

Delivering the inaugural address at the International Conference on Schizophrenia, of Schizophrenia Research Foundation (SCARF) on Thursday, she pointed out that they wanted several aspects of mental health to be taken care of at the primary healthcare institutions, as these are the facilities that are closest to the people. One small initiative towards this was postpartum depression programme for which an elaborate training session for medical officers and staff nurses of facilities conducting deliveries was held, she said.

“Like how we trained them to teach women on breastfeeding and nutrition, we gave them a module on postpartum depression. At the time of discharge after delivery, they will tell the woman about mental health, what she should do if she goes through depression, how she should report and that it is possible to be taken care of with proper medication,” she added.

Taking a cue from this, the official said that this could be replicated in many other issues, such as de-addiction as well. On the teleconsultation services being offered, Ms. Shilpa said that Tele-MANAS (14416) — known as ‘Natpudan Ungalodu’ — has two call centres and receives 5,000 calls a day.

Ashoka Malla, professor emeritus, McGill University, Canada, virtually delivered the fifth Dr. Sarada Menon Oration on ‘How do we protect the focus on persons with schizophrenia and other serious mental disorders: A tribute to Dr. Sarada Menon’. He noted that schizophrenia is the most serious of all mental health disorders and the suffering was a result of the consequences of illness and treatment, if it is insufficient and of poor quality.

Members of SCARF — Girija Vaidyanathan, member, Board of Management, S. Rajkumar, founder member, R. Padmavathi, director and R. Thara, vice chair — spoke on the occasion.