Admission experiences of psychiatric patients in tertiary care: An implication toward Mental Health Care Bill, 2013

Coercion is not uncommon phenomenon among mental health service users during their admission into psychiatric hospital. Research on perceived coercion of psychiatric patients is limited from India.

To investigate perceived coercion of psychiatric patients during admission into a tertiary care psychiatric hospital.

This was a cross-sectional descriptive survey carried out among randomly selected psychiatric patients (n = 205) at a tertiary care center. Data were collected through face-to-face interviews using structured questionnaire.

Our findings revealed that participants experienced low levels of coercion during their admission process. However, a majority of the participants were threatened with commitment (71.7%) as well as they were sad (67.8%), unpleased (69.7%), confused (73.2%), and frightened (71.2%) with regard to hospitalization into a psychiatric hospital. In addition, the participants expressed higher levels of negative pressures (mean ± standard deviation, 3.76 ± 2.12). Participants those were admitted involuntarily (P > 0.001), diagnosed to be having psychotic disorders (P > 0.003), and unmarried (P > 0.04) perceived higher levels of coercion.

The present study showed that more formal coercion was experienced by the patients those got admitted involuntarily. On the contrary, participants with voluntary admission encountered informal coercion (negative pressures). There is an urgent need to modify the Mental Health Care (MHC) Bill so that treatment of persons with mental illness is facilitated. Family member plays an important role in providing MHC; hence, they need to be empowered.