Let’s talk
on the most important and ignored topic of our society “Depression”. According to
a survey depression is the main psychiatric disorder in India. As we all know
that what is going in the whole world, Corona pandemic. Everyone is locked
themselves inside. Most of us are frustrated. We don’t know how long it will
take. We all are focusing on our physical health and very few of us are
concerned about the mental health. In recent days a news came about Sushant Singh Rajput . And this
topic suddenly highlighted. Sushant was a phenomenal artist. He was very
talented. He had money, a family, friends but due to persistent stress and
several other factors. He decided to suicide. So we can understand how
important is to take care of our mental state and most importantly recognizing
other’s condition. So we can help them. But before knowing the symptoms we need
to understand what is depression? According to WHO- Depression is a common
mental disorder that present with depressed mood, loss of interest or pleasure,
and poor concentration. So as we see
depression is not like fever and cold. It’s different so it need different
methods to take care other then medication.
Symptoms of depression:
-
Mostly depression come with anxiety
1. Persistent and pervasive sadness
2. Loss of
self worth or having a felling of excessive guilt
3. Physical weakness, loss of appetite. But in rare
cases there will be increase in appetite and due to this the person start
gaining weight.
4. Loss of concentration if you are student it will
affect your study
5. Sleep abnormalities- in depression you will wake
early than your regular time
6. Most important thoughts of having suicide, or
harming our self
IF the symptoms persist 2 or more week than the person may
be suffering from depression. And urgent medical help required.
It is noted that mostly these symptoms comes after something
bad happened in life but a person may also have these symptom without any
problem.
Causes:
Mostly 3 co-factors are
responsible
1. Biological factor- hereditary following of the
depression
-
Low level of hormones like dopamine, serotonin,
nor-epinephrine.
2. Psychological factor- Individuals are affected
by outside events differently. Each person’s thoughts determine how he or she
will experience life, which can affect whether or not they become depressed. Like
if the person have very positive outlook he or she will feed low for some time
but not fell depress than the person having negative. And the way we think
about things and view the world often emerges in childhood.
. 3. Environmental factors- depression can often be
triggered by very stressful life situations or other factor such as;
- A divorce, the death of a loved ones, by high expectation.
- Stressful workplace or demanding work
- -Health issues
- - Period of relationship conflicts, whether
martial or family related
- - By changing priorities- suppose you are in a
close relation with someone and suddenly the other person changes his/her priorities.
Types of depression:
In medical books depression is divided in various types
1.
Major depression- also called as Major
depressive disorder, clinical depression, unipolar depression or simple
depression. It involves low mood/loss of interest in normal activities. The person
will experience these symptoms for about more than 2 weeks
Depression can further divided into mild. Moderate
or severe;
- - Melancholic-term used for sever form of
depression with having many symptoms. One of the major changes is that the
person starts to move more slowly.
- - Psychotic depression- sometimes people with
depression imagining things which are not real. The start hallucinations (seeing
or hearing things that aren’t there) or delusions (false beliefs that aren’t shared by other), believe that they are being watched or followed or they are
bad, evil.
- - Post
partum/ postnatal depression- mother experience depression during pregnancy or
after the baby birth or within 1st year after pregnancy. In medical
term we use to refer this as ‘baby blues’ which is common condition related to
hormonal changes or due to new experience but this is totally different from
real depression. More simply we can say it is a stressful condition. About 80 %
will suffer from baby blues or about 10% suffer from real depression which
eventually affects the bond between baby and mother.
2. Most important Bipolar disorder- because the
mood of person will keep changing the will feel mania (opposite of depression)
at one moment and severe depression at another moment.
Bipolar disorder seems to be closely
related to family history. Stress and conflicts can trigger episodes for people
with this condition and it’s not uncommon for bipolar to be misjudged as
depression, ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) or schizophrenia
3. Cyclothymic disorder- is often described as
milder form of bipolar disorder. Basically the duration of mania and depression
is reduced
4. Dysthymic disorder- the symptoms are like other
major depression but are less severe.
5. Seasonal affective disorder [SAD]- it has
seasonal pattern. The cause is unclear. But it is thought that it is related to
light exposure. It is like that depression which was started in summer, ends when
winter arrives.
Depression in India:
According to the WHO report 2018 India is the most depressed
country in the world followed by China and U.S. From the population of 135
crore about 6.5 % people are suffering from some form of mental illness. The number
is around 8.5 crore, in which about 5 crore suffer from depression and rest of
3 crore suffer from anxiety disorder including panic attacks phobias, post
traumatic stress disorder, obsessive- compulsive disorder. According to the WHO
around 21 people are committing suicide per 1 lakh people. We have highest
teenage suicide globally. The rate of suicide in 2019 has increased by 52% from
what it is in 2007. And the economically loss due to mental health in between
2012-2020 is around 1.03 trillion dollars. According to the National Mental
Health Survey,2016 “70%- 92% of those in need of mental health care failed to receive
any treatment”. According to WHO in India for every 10 lakh people only 3
psychiatrists, 0.7 psychologists, 0.7 social workers. While in other common
wealth countries for every 10 lakh people there are 5.6 psychiatrists, if we compare
this to developed countries than the number goes to 66 per 10 lakh people.
Solution:
In our society mental health doesn’t hold that importance
that other health related problems do. It is like stigma of weakness or taboo
of being called as mad. India spends 0.16% of the total union health budget on
mental health, which is even less than that of Bangladesh which spend about
0.44%. "Man presan h to tan presan h"
Solution is simple we should spread awareness about the mental
health. Government can come with the policies where they can actually on a
practical basis create this awareness by media. So that people could get rid of
that fear of being called mad.
Educational institute plays an important role in solving the
problem students spend most of their time in school. As a sports teacher is necessary in every
school, mental health worker is necessary too. Because from the pressure
students are going through is extremely high. The Pressure of performance. Teacher
can console them. They can talk to them because talking to the children is the
biggest remedy. If you have doubt that the person is going to commit suicide
then go and talk to them about the thought of committing suicide. According to
the researches talking about the thoughts of suicide eventually reduces the
chances of committing suicide by that person. If you think you need medical
support go and consult a doctor. There are several ways to treat them according
to the severity. In rural areas government can employee mental health worker
with every Anganwadi workers.
Today’s time is very crucial. We all are locked inside,
isolated and frustrated. This is the time where we not only focus on our
personal health but on other’s too. Go talk to them, try to spend some time
with them. Your little efforts can save someone’s life.
Most important learn how to say no:
Feeling overwhelmed can worsen anxiety and depression symptoms. Setting boundaries in you professional and personal can help you better.
Need to take care of your self :
Sometime depression doesn't respond to medication . You can improve your condition by ignoring negative people around , do what gave you happiness. Some other treatment options may also help- Electroconvulsive therapy( ECT) or repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS)
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