Neuro biological understanding needs more clarity today as depressions that take place in individuals vary from one another. Identifying the psychiatric syndromes is a challenge for psychiatrists, says Dr Prasad Rao, psychiatrist, Asha Hospital, Hyderabad.

The last decade has brought in a sea change in the psychopharmacology. Availability of new molecules has helped in identifying psychiatric syndromes to some extent. People are aware today that mental disorders can be treated. Innovative psycho therapeutic options and sound cognitive therapies have emerged, which no doubt are helping in understanding clearly the state of patients and possible reasons thereby leading to abnormal behaviour.

Dr Rao mentioned that during 1950s, there were about 50 psychiatrists in India and about 10-15 in Andhra Pradesh. But AP has today over 200 psychiatrists. But, there is a long way to go in this endeavour. There are no psychiatrists in districts such as Adilabad and Nizamabad of AP and such situations need to be addressed.

A decade ago, psychiatrists were not very clear what falls into psychiatry and what not. But, in the last one decade the disorders that fall under the purview of psychiatry and others could properly demarked. Psychiatry has been seen as a separate specialty. Psychiatrists are even approached by people for reasons such as marital problems, stress due to work or studies and for other reasons. Children with disorders are brought to psychiatrists much earlier these days, which is helping in treating them or making them normal early, he opined.

Preventive aspects of psychiatry have emerged and there has been sufficient scientific evidence that psychiatry is causing delay in onset of disorders. And the mean hospital stay of patients has come down to great extent with the help of effective medicine available today.

The main concern for psychiatrists today is of reducing the longer periods of medication. There is also a belief that such longer medications can lead to lot of side effects on patients. And the need for offering tailor made medicine or treatment to patients is recognised widely, he added.

He was speaking at a lecture organized by Human Understanding and Tolerance Society at Hyderabad on Thursday.