Neuro-psychiatrist warns against psychosomatic diseases, hypochondria

RANCHI: Sunita (name changed), 45 suffered with palpitations and was almost sure to have developed severe cardiac disorder. Repeated diagnostics at various private clinics carried out to ascertain her cardiac problems remained negative. Rajendra Kumar, 35 had unexplained headache for which he first got a bifocal specs made and became a weekly visitor to nearby doctors clinic for a regular checkup of blood pressure. He now believes that he is suffering with some sort of tumour and is ready to go for CT scan of brain.


Both the cases are not isolated as patients, hundreds in number often visit physician’s clinic and private nursing homes and even hospitals for diagnosis of their unexplained ailment and end coughing up huge sums and even sometimes resort to self-medication. Neuro psychiatrist at Ranchi Institute of neuro psychiatry and allied sciences (RINPAS) Dr Siddhartha Sinha has recently started a campaign to spread awareness about mental health in which noted bolywood actor Anupam Kher and director Mahesh Bhatt have joined hands voluntarily. “The issue is serious because such patients actually have no physical ailment and are suffering with kind of neurosis termed hypochondriasis and repeated diagnosis burns hole in the pocket at one hand and self-medication or wrong treatment aggravates the situation,” Dr Sinha said.


Professor in medicine at Rajendra Institute of Medical sciences (RIMS) Dr JK Mitra admitted to have got patients suffering with psychosomatic disorders who request for tests and often complain of unexplained pain. “The body of a mentally sick person sometimes becomes sick but there are cases when patients are not diagnosed with any problem and we advise them to see a psychiatrist,” he said. Dr Sinha explained that apart from the feeling of being ill –hypochondriasis another common problem is in the category of dissociation disorder which is often mistaken for epilepsy. “Dissociative convulgence mimics epilepsy and can be easily treated if the patient consults psychiatrist,” he said admitting that associated taboo with mental ill-health is a major deterrent.


Recently the number of patients visiting RINPAS and Central Institute of Psychiatry (CIP) has increased manifold. According to rough estimates around 1.68 lakhs patients visited both these premiere mental institutes in the 2015-16 and on an average 600 patients visit the outpatient door. “There has been some awareness but it is confined to the poor section of the society, reluctance among educated classes to visit a mental health clinic is more common,” Dr Sinha said pointing to the fact that there has been an increase in the overall cases of mental ill-health, particularly of substance abuse which has increased the number of patients footfall in these institutions.