Honours for psychiatric excellence efforts

November 16, 2009 05:47:42 PM

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Efforts to move care for psychiatric patients outside psychiatric hospital St Giles and into the community have earned Fiji a top international award.

Fiji shares the award for Excellence in Psychiatric Development by the Asian Federation of Psychiatric Association (AFPA) with Sri Lanka, Cambodia and the Cook Islands.

The award was given for developing psychiatric services in the country through basic training.

Mental health consultant Dr Odille Chang who has worked with the Ministry of Health for many years, received the award on Fiji’s behalf.

Chang told FijiLive that one of the movements in the past five years was to move out of St Giles Hospital and into the community.

“So while the award is still to the nurses of psychiatric health services in Fiji, we owe as much to our public health colleagues and those in the general hospitals who embraced us moving out of St Giles,” she said.

Chang said they had trained public health nurses to be able to look after psychiatric patients in areas not covered by St Giles.

Permanent secretary for Health Dr Salanieta Saketa said the award was a big achievement for Fiji and Dr Chang’s presence to receive it was appropriate as she had been at the forefront of the movement to further develop and improve Fiji’s psychiatric services through mental health training and awareness.

Saketa added that many lower income countries were still suffering from neglect of mental health teaching, practical training, services and lack of research.

The Asian Federation of Psychiatric Associations (AFPA) was founded on September 11, 2005 and launched in 2007 in Lahore, Pakistan with the aim of improving psychiatry in Asia.

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