THE STRONGEST PEOPLE WIN BATTLES THAT ARE WITHIN THEM
Mental Health refers to how we think, feel & behave.Mental Health problems can affect an individual’s daily life, relationships or physical health.Mental ill-Health is a broad term, used to describe the range of mental health problems; from those with mild symptoms to the most sever mental disorders.
The prevalence of mental health problems in Pakistan is increasing rapidly due to current violent situation in Pakistani society . Common mental health problems have been identified in both the rural and urban population which seems to have a positive association with socio-economic adversities, relationship problems and lack of social support. Depressive and anxiety disorders appear to be highest followed by bipolar, schizophrenia, psychosomatic disorders, obsessive compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder. There is also a high prevalence of depression among Afghan refugees residing in Pakistan. In addition, there is a serious problem of substance misuse and drug addiction. About four million drug addicts have been estimated in the last national survey in Pakistan with a growing number of injectable drug users in the urban population creating the public health predicament. However, the incidence among adults is under-reported due to social stigma in the context of family pride. Nevertheless, the current wave of violence and aggression in Pakistani society is not a simple phenomenon. There has been an increase in violence over the past five years in Pakistan, such as suicide attacks, explosions, and even safety precautions, such as long curfew hours have caused damage on an unprecedented scale. The local inhabitants have experienced a heavy battle between the security forces and insurgents. In addition to the continuous violence and threat to life, there has also been a damaging effect to the psychological health of many people. Psychological trauma as consequence of violence is on the rise, prevailing in the whole area . As a result, individuals are manifesting a number of symptoms of psychological trauma, which is affecting all aspects of their lives.
A survey of mental health problems of university students was carried out on 1850 participants in the age range 19–26 years. An indigenous Student Problem Checklist (SPCL) developed by Mahmood & Saleem, (2011), 45 items is a rating scale, designed to determine the prevalence rate of mental health problem among university students. This scale relates to four dimensions of mental health problems as reported by university students, such as: Sense of Being Dysfunctional, Loss of Confidence, Lack of self Regulation and Anxiety Proneness. For interpretation of the overall SPCL score, the authors suggest that scores falling above one SD should be considered as indicative of severe problems, where as score about 2 SD represent very severe problems. Our finding show that 31% of the participants fall in the “severe” category, whereas 16% fall in the “very severe” category. As far as the individual dimensions are concerned, 17% respondents comprising sample of the present study fall in very severe category Sense of Being Dysfunctional, followed by Loss of Confidence (16%), Lack of Self Regulation (14%) and Anxiety Proneness (12%). These findings are in lying with similar other studies on mental health of students. The role of variables like sample characteristics, the measure used, cultural and contextual factors are discussed in determining rates as well as their implications for student counseling service in prevention and intervention.
Suicide rate in students have increased in Pakistan during past few years and despite the fact, official statistics are still unknown. Suicide is the common unnatural cause of death and the cases are often not reported subject to social stigma. Therefore, diagnosing and covering such cases is usually difficult. The objective of the study was to carry out a qualitative analysis of suicides committed by the students in Pakistan. A Retrospective study was done and 68 cases were retrieved from 11 renowned e-newspapers over the period of eight years (i.e.2010–2017). Suicide rate was higher in male (76.5%) than females (23.5%). Of them 42.6% were from schools,23.5% colleges and 22.1% from universities. Methods for suicides were hanging (33.8%), gunshot (27.9%),poison (13.2%), jumping from height (5.9%), burn (4.4%), and wrist cutting (1.5%). Reported cases were from Punjab (52.9%), Sindh (23.6%) and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (8.9%). Common reasons were failure in exams(23.6%), scolded by parents (11.8%), failure in love (8.8%), domestic issues (5.9%), harsh attitude of teachers(5.9%), life dissatisfaction (4.4%), ragging (2.9%) and poverty (1.9%). The figures are believed to be an underestimate due to lack of reporting, socio-cultural and religious stigma.
Thus, to determine the epidemiology of suicide by students in Pakistan, a standard system of recording should be established to help design effective suicide prevention programs.We should take part in controlling this situation with proper measures.
