Care Seeking and Beliefs About the Cause of Mental Illness Among Nigerian Psychiatric Patients and Their Families
Objective:This study examined treatment seeking by 219 psychiatric patients at a teaching hospital in Kano, Nigeria. Methods:Patients or their families were interviewed about the types of mental health healers that patients saw before seeking conventional psychiatric treatment and beliefs about the...
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Veröffentlicht in: | Psychiatric services (Washington, D.C.) D.C.), 2012-06, Vol.63 (6), p.616-618 |
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Sprache: | eng |
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Zusammenfassung: | Objective:This study examined treatment seeking by 219 psychiatric patients at a teaching hospital in Kano, Nigeria.
Methods:Patients or their families were interviewed about the types of mental health healers that patients saw before seeking conventional psychiatric treatment and beliefs about the causes of the illness.
Results:The length of illness before the psychiatric consultation was 4.5 years, and 99 (45%) respondents reported that patients had previously sought religious healing. A majority of respondents (N=128, 59%) attributed the illness to supernatural forces. Up to 68% and 75% of respondents who believed in a medical or genetic cause of illness, respectively, reported seeking a psychiatric consultation within six months of onset, and about 70% who believed in supernatural forces reported seeking psychiatric consultation five years after onset or later (p |
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ISSN: | 1075-2730 1557-9700 |
DOI: | 10.1176/appi.ps.201000343 |