Poor living conditions 'making workers mentally ill'

POOR working and living conditions of labourers are increasingly causing some of them to end up at the psychiatric unit in the country, a senior government official has said.

Dr Suhaila Ghuloum, who is the assistant chair of Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC)’s Psychiatry Department, told Gulf Times that “about 98% of the expatriate workers who come here are also subsequently deported, even after completing a medical course.”

“You know their living conditions are much different to what they may have anticipated. Their salaries too may be much less; they might also have problems with actually receiving this salary on time; and they have a lot of debts back home,” said Dr Ghuloum, who is a Member of Royal College (MRC), Psychiatry.

“This puts them under a lot of pressure because even if they wanted to go back, they cannot, as the looming debt-collector is always on their mind.”

According to her, if a patient does want to continue to work the fact that they have had a mental illness - even though acute - comes in the way and most likely they are deported from the country. A small minority that ends up staying with the sponsors are those who have been associated with them for a while and have proven themselves at work.

“This is one of the problems that we regularly face when we want to discharge somebody from the hospital after an acute mental-related illness; the sponsor wants to send them back and the patient himself may want to go,” Dr Ghuloum said.

“But the first worry they describe is that I have a huge debt and I don’t know how I can pay it off when I get back.”

The total number of outpatient visits at the HMC’s Department of Psychiatry figured at 17,882 compared to 14,964, a decade ago.

On how the workers end up at the hospital, the mental-health expert said: “Most of the time they are taken to the emergency room by their colleagues or room-mates, and from there the patients are sent to us for evaluation.”

Symptoms, according to her, would include, shouting; wandering on the streets and a sudden change in the behaviour. On other occasions, one could simply go mute; not respond to anything or refuse to eat or drink.