hamburger icon
A
अ
Read in Hindi
  • Home
  • News
  • Stressed & depressed? Here's a helpline at your aid

Stressed & depressed? Here's a helpline at your aid

WrittenBy

Written By: Editorial Team | Updated : April 20, 2015 6:44 PM IST

thehealthsite.com top news

Harsh Mariwala, Chairman, Marico Ltd. has collaborated with a mental health helpline, called iCALL, to make mental healthcare available to everyone across ages, classes, castes, languages and locations.

According to him, one of the key challenges which India is currently facing is that mental health concerns often go unrecognized in Indian society. Today s extremely competitive environment, rapid urbanization, busy lifestyle, rising levels of unemployment, displacement, violence, migration and housing issues are causing uncertainty and stress in people s daily lives.

He chalks down three reasons why mental health manifestations often go unchecked:

Also Read

  1. Lack of awareness about the debilitating impact of mental health concerns on our functioning and wellbeing. It is only recently that Deepika Padukone has come out with her struggles with depression, thus creating a space to talk about such issues.
  2. Stigma attached to seeking mental health services. There is resistance to approach mental health professionals and seeking help for mental health concerns
  3. Poor quality, access and availability of mental health services. Good quality services, if at all, are expensive and available to a very niche class of people.

He informed that he is very passionate about mental health in India and is struck by the lack of awareness, high level of stigma and poor infrastructure/ provisions/support in India. Hence, in his personal capacity he is trying to make these services available to everyone. His aim is to create a counselling ecosystem with a 3 pronged strategy; covering the following aspects:

  1. Psychiatrist for referrals of patients with severe mental health illnesses
  2. Mobile consulting vans near schools, colleges and parks
  3. Preventive counselling techniques including yoga, meditation and lifestyle awareness drives

His first step in this direction has been to tie up with a mental health helpline, called iCALL. iCALL is a telephone based helpline that started out as a TISS initiative over two years ago and has been providing valuable mental health support services to multitudes of callers in multiple languages across multiple locations. They also provide counselling through email.

To create a 360 degree approach to creating a mental health ecosystem, my vision includes holistically addressing mental health concerns using four pillars- creating awareness, quality training, effective service delivery and robust referral system.

Helpline: +91.022.25563291 - Monday to Saturday (10am to 10pm) Email ID: icall@tiss.edu

You may also like to read:

For more articles on diseases & conditions, visit our diseases & conditions section. For daily free health tips, sign up for our newsletter.

Add The Health Site as a Preferred Source Add The Health Site as a Preferred Source

Disclaimer: The content on TheHealthSite.com is only for informational purposes. It is not at all professional medical advice. Always consult your doctor or a healthcare specialist for any questions regarding your health or a medical condition.

Editorial Team

Editorial Team

... Read More