Mental healthcare emerges from the shadows

An Ying, 37, gets help at Jing-xinyuan five days a week. "I love to be here with our teachers and friends. We share our experiences and can also get medical help in the residential area. It's much better than staying in the hospital."

An, who taught in a kindergarten, was diagnosed with schizophrenia at age 23. She spent three months at Huilongguan Hospital and now takes her medicine on time every day.

After leaving the hospital, she said, she could stick with a task or activity for only one hour before growing anxious. Now, with rehabilitation training, she can participate at the center for more than two hours.

The center provides several classes, including reading and homemaking, to help its patients become self-sufficient. Activities run from 9 to 11 am and 2 to 5 pm. An and her patient-friends are there every day, and they can contact a teacher directly if needed. Doctors and nurses from Huilongguan come to give professional medical guidance, individually and in group sessions, every week.

"Medical help is quite essential to the patients," nurse Zhao Jing said. "Every Wednesday is doctor's day. Patients and their family members will come and we do discussion face-to-face, which is very effective to improve their mental condition."

Zhao believes that rehabilitation therapy is the best way to help mental patients back into society. "Some patients stay in the hospital for more than two decades, which only makes their social ability worse," she said.

Before Jingxinyuan was established, many patients could only stay at home, and their family members often formed support groups. They gathered regularly with others in the same situation to share what they had learned from doctors and books and to help each other.

That's still the best option for thousands in Beijing who need mental rehabilitation. Jingxinyuan can accommodate only 15 patients.

Expectations

China, of course, is not the only country trying to provide mental health services more effectively and efficiently. The United States started in the 1960s to replace long-stay psychiatric hospitals with less isolated, community mental health service for people diagnosed with a mental disorder or developmental disability.

That movement reduced the number of psychiatric hospital beds from 560,000 to 140,000, and boosted the share of services provided outside hospitals from 22.6 to 71.6 percent. It also cut patients' expenditures on their illness, from $15,600 a year to $900, according to an article published last year in the journal Chinese Health Resources.

Yang, Huilongguan's president, said community mental health centers in many developed countries usually are staffed by clinical psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, doctors who treat physical illness, social workers, psychiatric nurses, and other support staff.

Each team has one or two psychiatrists. All team members have received professional training, and have not only solid professional knowledge but also rich social experiences to handle all kinds of interpersonal relationships.

Beijing carried out a survey on the living conditions of mentally disabled people last year. When the report is issued - no date has been announced - it is expected to recommend the addition of more psychiatric rehabilitation centers.

"The system has not yet been built in China," Yang said. "Jingxinyuan is the first attempt and we are calling for more. Having a good mental disease medical system is not only needed to meet the great need, but also to show the country's attitude toward mental disease.

"Despite good living conditions," he said, "a healthy mental condition is also essential to make a happy life."