Chandigarh : The Department of Psychiatry, PGIMER, Chandigarh, held a press conference , 8 October addressing the World Mental Health Day theme, “Access to Services – Mental Health in Catastrophes and Emergencies”. The conference was a formal media event to share information, updates, and calls to action regarding global mental health issues with a special focus on world mental health day theme “Access to Services – Mental Health in Catastrophes and Emergencies”Prof. Subho Chakrabarti, Principal Investigator of the Regional Coordinating Center for Tele-MANAS,PGIMER led the five-member team, which included Dr. Rahul Chakravarty (Assistant Professor), Dr Raj Laxmi (Senior Resident), Mr. Abhishek Verma, and Ms. Sonu Aggarwal, emphasizing the importance of scaling mental health access. He opened the address by emphasizing the importance of scaling access to mental health services and outlining the department’s initiatives towards this goal including Tele-MANAS and Tele- Psychiatry Services. Together the team emphasizes the urgent need for mental health support during global catastrophes and emergencies, noting that a significant minority of people who experience such events develop serious mental health conditions.They discussed the role of tele-psychiatry in enhancing mental health service accessibility, particularly in challenging circumstances. Prof. Subho and Dr. Raj Laxmi talked about the role of Tele-Psychiatry Services at PGIMER, Chandigarh, and the massive scale-up during the COVID-19 pandemic and their current range of specialized remote therapies, including Individual Cognitive Stimulation Therapy (iCST) for Dementia and Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) for OCD among others. The press conference underscored the vital role of tele-health services like Tele-MANAS in overcoming the barriers to access that are exacerbated during crises, disasters, and emergencies.
It was emphasized that Tele-MANAS under the aegis of the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW) was an essential tele-health service for breaking down access barriers and delivering Psychological First Aid (PFA) remotely to maintain continuity of care when physical services are disrupted. It was also discussed how the service, through the Toll free number 14416, employs a structured framework for crisis intervention, including suicide prevention module called “Manasvita”. Counsellors receive Gatekeeper’s Training and are taught to assess the risk of harm to self. The service provides support from Tier-1 counsellors, who can escalate calls to specialists (clinical psychologists, psychiatric social worker or psychiatrists) via phone or video (Tier-2), and refers patients to the nearest District Mental Health Programme (DMHP) centre for in-person follow-up. The toll free number is 14416.
Dr Rahul Chakravarty also talked about suicide prevention with the help of TeleMANAS. He also emphasised that Suicide is a social phenomenon which affects every socioeconomic group and hence every person in the society must help in resolving the issues behind suicide.The press conference included questions from the media and later Prof. Subho Chakrabarti concluded that tele-psychiatry has successfully reduced waiting times, enhanced the quality of clinician–patient interaction, and improved treatment adherence and patient satisfaction. By minimizing travel barriers, the service has become a reliable and sustainable bridge between patients and mental health professionals at the Department of Psychiatry, PGIMER.
