Mo,

I think this situation reflects the present condition of the country.The
other time our "Great President"was telling Gambians that it takes "5
minutes" to see a doctor ,this must be nr one health service in the
world.This takes us back to our old points,at the times they were roaming
the world taking  loans and building hospitals without any plan,we insisted
that this was no way to go by in developing healthcare in the country.Today
drug shortages in the country is becoming a nightmare for every hospital
worker .We need people who understand the nature of our problems to be able
to lead us to a better health care and progress.The situation is sad and
Jammeh should sell his jet plane and donate the money to the Mental home.

For Freedom
Saiks


>From: Momodou Camara <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: FWD:Campama "Madness" Reaches Crisis Point
>Date: Tue, 6 Jul 2004 12:18:01 -0500
>
>Campama "Madness" Reaches Crisis Point
>
>The Independent (Banjul)
>NEWS
>July 2, 2004
>Posted to the web July 6, 2004
>Banjul
>
>Campama Psychiatry's dearth of medicinal drugs to treat its mentally
>deranged patients has reached crisis point with violent inmates, being
>allowed to leave the country's only mental home, which is at its wits' end
>in dealing with the chronic shortage.
>
>Fresh reports reaching The Independent midweek allude to the fact that the
>overwhelming majority of Campama inmates with varying degree of mental
>imbalance have been released back to the community as Campama grapples with
>the chronically acute shortage of drugs to calm violent fits of patients.
>Reasons being ascribed for freeing the inmates include the chronic lack of
>medicines and what close relatives of some of the inmates called the
>skeletal staff who have been "mentally and physically overstretched" to
>look after over a hundred patients. According to these reports only a
>handful of inmates are left in the mental home, whose personnel recently
>made plaintive calls to the Royal Victoria Teaching Hospital for the
>provision of drugs to treat its neglected inmates. Due to the frequency of
>violence among inmates at Campama, the demand for nerve-calming drugs has
>been of permanent significance.
>
>"We understand and accept these reasons for these inmates being let out,
>but imagine the danger these sick people pose to the society, women and
>children especially. Many of these runaway Campama inmates can be seen
>roaming our markets and other public places. Are we to sit and wait for
>another disaster like the one which happened in Bakau, where two people
>were killed by a mentally deranged man just months ago" a concerned
>relative of one Campama inmate who wished to remain anonymous lamented.
>
>According to him, his brother who was mentally imbalanced had escaped from
>the Campama Psychiatric home months ago and was rehabilitated by his
>family, since at the time he had not shown any propensity for violence and
>was not therefore an apparent threat to anyone.
>
>"However, recently he has been quite violent and dangerous even for his own
>relatives. He is capable of doing harm and we took him back to Campama for
>him to be readmitted. To our utter surprise, we were told that the only
>mental home in the country no longer takes in patients. It left us
>completely flabbergasted," he explained, lamentably adding; "many other
>mentally disturbed patients have been allowed to leave the mental home with
>serious risks to society. Something must be done about it".
>
>He said the only positive response by the Department of State for Health
>should be the requisitioning of medical materials and medicines, which
>would see patients who have been allowed to rejoin society but still with
>mental deficiencies to be readmitted at the mental home.
>
>This development comes days after The Independent reported what it called
>the "cataclysmic" level to which the acute shortage of drugs to treat
>patients at the Campama hospital has reached. This dreary situation had
>prompted the psychiatric centre to stop admitting patients with advanced
>stages of mental illnesses as the RVTH allegedly failed to respond
>positively.
>
>Overwhelmed by the situation senior hospital staff thought the only prudent
>measure at their disposal was to suspend the admittance of more patients at
>the centre in the interim as they struggle to deal with the dearth in
>drugs, which according to sources the Royal Victoria Teaching Hospital is
>not in a position to provide. Sources claimed that the decision not to
>admit patients was effected since May when the situation aggravated.
>
>A senior official at the psychiatric centre who wished to remain anonymous
>told The Independent that they had written to the RVTH management,
>communicating to them their concerns over the chronic lack of drugs there.
>He said the dispatch had conveyed their request for the teaching hospital
>to supply the psychiatric centre with drugs to deal with mental cases in
>the short term. The conditions in Campama are getting worse every day, they
>added.
>
>"A lot of patients are still being brought in although we are at pains to
>let the world know that little or no drugs are available to treat them, and
>we are facing problems to deal with them" he added. He also accused the
>RVTH of being negligent about conditions at the Campama, with its
>management team hardly even making routine inspections of the psychiatric
>centre, the only mental home in the country. "This can only amount to the
>fact that the RVTH does not care about what happens at the Campama" he
>protested.
>
>Another anonymous Campama staff also decried the state of the food being
>made available to inmates, which he described as "very poor and unhygienic
>diet". He said as a result patients hardly eat. The anonymous official
>further revealed that even the beds of the hospital were full of bed bugs,
>which make it difficult for inmates to sleep.
>
>"When we informed the RVTH management about these things they were never in
>the habit of responding positively" he claimed, adding that the doors in
>the hospital rooms are not in good shape, making it easy for people with
>mental problems to slip out without the knowledge of the hospital
>staff. "Two inmates were killed in motor traffic after they escaped from
>the compound this way" he explained.
>
>
>
>
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