Child and Adolescent Psychiatry

Type Book Section - Bridging the Mental Health Gap in India: Issues and Perspectives
Title Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2016
Page numbers 463-478
Publisher Springer
URL https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-81-322-3619-1_25
Abstract
Almost 20 % of children and adolescents suffer from some form of mental illness, but a very small proportion of them are able to access mental health services that results in a huge treatment gap. The situation is particularly grim in India where almost 30 % of population of the country consists of children in the age group between 0 and 14 years. There could be several possible reasons for this gap ranging from stigma associated with mental illnesses, lack of resources for mental health and apathy on part of policy makers to counter this problem. Although several steps have been taken like formulation of national mental health policy and programme(s) to increase coverage for mental health in India, a lot remains to be done. In the chapter, we emphasize that access to mental health care is a human right and describe the current mental health resource situation for children and adolescents in India, and highlight certain alternate modes of service delivery like school mental health services, provision of services at primary care and use of technology to reach remote areas. We also emphasizes the need for multidisciplinary training of child and adolescent mental health professionals, introduction of topics related to child and adolescent mental health in psychiatry, pediatrics and undergraduate curriculum as well as task sharing/task shifting approaches.

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