For a system of measures to humanize the treatment of people with mental disorders insist authoritative judges, lawyers and human rights defenders. Changes to the Health Act which guaranteed greater control in psychiatry were rejected by this parliament.
That is why another tragic case of a patient who died in a fire in the hospital in Varna again awakened their reaction to the need for urgent reform in psychiatric care. The family of the deceased is also demanding many answers, BNT reported.
"I don't even know how to begin what I want to pour out of myself, what happened to me and my family. My father was very good, compassionate, kind, caring and devoted. The most intelligent person in my life so far. It's just that fate saddled him with a bad mental illness."
This is shared by the son of the patient who burned in the psychiatry in Varna. In 18 years of experience with mental illness, this is the fifth time his father has been forced into treatment. As a former teacher himself, he was well known and highly respected in the community. And now the family is extremely broken. They sent their father to the hospital to help him, only to find out that he was isolated and tied up, with no one to hear him and save him from the flames. Today, after the shock of the horror experienced has dulled, his family asks.
"Why is there no video surveillance, why are there no doctors, nurses and attendants to monitor the condition of the patients, why is there no fire alarm system. Why was he put in there without supervision, why was he put in there without checking what he had in him.
The son's letter also makes something else clear. His father was first admitted to the hospital for 5 days, after which he was discharged in an even worse condition. The doctors wanted the court's decision on forced treatment to come out first. However, the court assigned the case 2 months later. During which time, the man's condition worsened even more.
"What happened in this particular case is not normal either from the point of view of reason or from the point of view of the law. And in its current arrangement, the law on health, which foresees the possibility of preventing a serious accident, motivated by the person's illness, to be accommodated against his will. One is when a psychiatrist has determined that the condition is critical and urgent, then the medical institution immediately submits a proposal to the court, based on which the court in a very short period of time schedules an open hearing, in which the person's condition must be directly ascertained. ; said Vladislava Tsarigradska - judge.
The second possibility, in less obvious situations of risk, is for the prosecutor to request the intervention of the court, which must make a decision within two weeks. And not for two or three months, as was the practice in the case of the deceased man.
"The participation of a lawyer is mandatory in these proceedings. So two or three months is a problem that is not due to the law," said judge Vladislava Tsarigradska.
With her serious experience as a judge in Lukovit, where the largest psychiatric hospital - "Karlukovo" is located, Vladislava Tsarigradska, together with authoritative lawyers, judges and human rights defenders, prepared changes in the law on health, which will limit the abuse of the rights of the mentally ill.
"The most significant thing that would have had an effect on this tragic incident is the envisaged entirely new procedure with increased judicial control over their forced mobilization or for your viewers to understand the tying down of psychiatric patients. At the present moment, the haste to chain a person to a hospital bed is done entirely at the discretion, under the internal departmental control of the relevant medical facility and the doctors there," commented judge Vladislava Tsarigradska.
In the last days of the parliament's work, these changes were rejected in committee with not particularly clear arguments. And now no one can guarantee that the abuse of the rights of mentally ill patients will stop, and the fire in the hospital in Varna will be the last.