Poor care for mentally ill patients

2009-09-07

The quality of care for mentally ill patients is at a very low level in the Czech Republic, according to data obtained by the daily publication Pravo. There are around 150,000 mentally ill patients in the Czech Republic, of the overall national population of 10 million. As many as 90% of them are in psychiatric clinics, although, in many of these cases, outpatient care would be sufficient. Involuntary hospitalisation is not the only problem for mentally ill patients in the Czech healthcare system. According to Vaclav Krasa, the chairman of the Czech National Disability Council, quoted by the newspaper, psychiatric hospitals do not provide good conditions for patients resident there. This means a lack of privacy when bathing or using the toilet, large wards (which contain up to 17 patients) and the excessive use of restraints.
According to a study carried out by Kolumbus, the association which deals with the protection of the rights of the mentally disabled in the Czech Republic, which was presented by the Czech News Agency, more than 70% of the patients of psychiatric hospitals and the psychiatric wards of general hospitals were satisfied with their treatment. The most pervasive problem noted by patients was the lack of information provided to them (in general). This issue was raised by 56% of mentally ill patients. Approximately one-third of those canvassed felt insufficiently informed about their diagnoses, and around 25% about the medicines they use.