three therapies of south india 63
that off ers outpatient services and wards that can accommodate 500 male and
female inpatients. JJ Hospital is a small, private mental hospital in Trivandrum
that provides outpatient services and accommodates about 20 inpatients at a
time. Th ese hospitals are staff ed by psychiatrists and medical students who
consult with and treat patients as part of the training for their Diploma in
Psychiatric Medicine. A variety of middle-class and poorer patients patronize
the Medical College Hospital and Peroorkada Mental Health Centre, where
the treatment is free and the cost of medications is subsidized. Th e private
JJ Hospital treats patients from higher socioeconomic backgrounds.
Outpatient care at these facilities consists primarily of consultations with
doctors and the administration of medications. During the fi rst consultation
with a new patient, the psychiatrist spends 30 to 40 minutes listening to the
patient and accompanying relatives or friends describe the characteristics and
history of the patient’s illness. Like biomedical psychiatrists in North America
and ayurvedic psychiatrists in Kerala, they assess the physical health of their
patients and perform cognitive functioning and memory tests to account for
any physical or neurological disability before making a tentative diagnosis.
Psychiatrists use diagnostic categories from the International Classifi cation
of Diseases—10th Edition or ICD-10, which is similar to the Diagnostic and
Table 1. Health Infrastructure of Kerala.
Medical System Facilities Beds Doctors
Health Infrastructure of Kerala—Public
Allopathy^18 1,249 42,438 9,998
Ayurveda 686 2,309 621
Homeopathy 405 950 621
Other Systems 0 0 0
Total 2,340 45,697 11,240
Health Infrastructure of Kerala—Private
Allopathy 3,565 49,030 6,335
Ayurveda 3,925 1,301 4,130
Homeopathy 421 2,078 2,168
Other Systems 95 139 100
Total 8,006 52,548 12,733
Complied from: State Planning Board Health Infrastructure and Development Indicators (1996), in
Dr. V. S. Mani “Major Mental Health Issues in Kerala.” Paper. Kerala Mental Health Authority
(1998).
Note: Th is data comes from Kerala government sources, and information on some types of heal-
ers is not available. For example, the temple, mosque and church discussed in this chapter are not
offi cially considered part of the health infrastructure of Kerala.