Volume 11 Issues 1 January, 2021
Guest Editorial: The charm of psychiatry
The pandemic has been a boon for psychiatry–about its awareness, importance and need to learn more about it and practice it. Psychological and emotional effects of the pandemic or the consequent lockdown were felt by almost all people, and were very bother some for many. Fear, anxiety including health anxiety, depression, loneliness, boredom, sleep disturbances were some of the more common conditions affecting people with or without the covid-19 infections. The stigma towards mental health became less, as the importance of caring for mental health and mind during the pandemic gained significance. This is but one example of the significance of psychiatry in almost every medical disease and/or its treatment. Psychiatry is not a specialisation for specific psychiatric disorders only, but for the numerous other medical conditions. Knowledge of psychiatry is important in the general, over all, multi-disciplinary and holistic care of the patient. These are also days of multi morbidity and co-morbidity–people have multiple interrelated and unrelated disorders or diseases. People with hypertension also are at a risk to have diabetes, is chemic heart disease and depression. Those with diabetes mellitus area A at a risk to develop depression, cardio vascular diseases and stroke. Hypothyroidism is associated with depressive disorders and is also an important differential diagnosis, to distinguish between hypothyroidism and depressions in the features are so similar. When both hypothyroidism and depression co-exist, it is a bigger challenge.
Mental health problems are a common co-morbid condition co-existing with the non communicable diseases. Not all medical n students will be lucky enough to become psychiatrists due to shortage of seats or them having more interest in other specialities. But they would need to have a good knowledge about psychiatry, psychology, counselling and communication skills in order to care for their patients, irrespective of the disease their patients may suffer from. Knowledge and interesting psychiatry makes medical practice even more charming. The pandemic also forced people to think about alternatives and innovations, especially in teaching, learning and educating. A lot depends on how teachers teach, which can motivate and inspire students, and make them skillful and competent. The same applies to teaching and learning about psychiatry. If the significance of psychiatry is conveyed in an interesting way which improves clinical practice, definitely all medical students will develop interest and get attracted to learn about psychiatry. Thus, online teaching of psychiatry needs to explore innovative methods of teaching using a variety of novel teaching methods. Problem based learning is one, in which psychiatry (including aspects of behaviour, emotions and psychology)gets discussed and taught, quite naturally. and automatically. The teaching of psychiatry should be made simple, understandable and the complex jargon should be avoided, while retaining its uniqueness and charm. That would go along way to make medical practice complete, and the physicians competent in all aspects, including mental health.
Dr Santosh K Chaturvedi, MD, FRCPsych
Consultant Psychiatrist,
Former Dean and Senior Professor of Psychiatry @ NIMHANS, Bangalore.
Website https://santoshchaturvedi.in/
Twitter @skchatur
Linked-in sk-chaturvedi
Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santosh_Kumar_Chaturvedi
