Do Regular Mental Checkups Says Experts

VARANASI: According to an old saying a healthy body owns a healthy mind but now it is more likely that only a healthy mind can allow one to have a healthy body too. Hence, the new age health mantra is to go for a routine mental health checkups or 'screenings' say mental fitness experts.

In a very unique initiative, a week-long free 'screening' programme has been organised from October 4 to October 12 in the department of psychiatry, Banaras Hindu University to mark the World Mental Health Day on October 10. The programme has been held with an aim to encourage people from every walk of life to come and have a friendly chat with the psychiatrist.

According to the head of the psychiatry department, Dr Sanjay Gupta, the process has been very successful so far as in the process some of the most intrinsic fears or disorders have come to surface in the people who considered themselves healthy.

"Most of these people, some of whom are high placed executives, never realised until they came here for the screening that they were suffering from some problems at mental level that needed immediate attention. These problems or fears are mostly stress related and can easily be taken care of by bringing a little change in life style. But any problem can be treated only when after being diagnosed," observed the doctor.

As per the doctor, on an average 20-25 people are being screened daily at the department. Just like regular physical health checkups, even for the mental health checkups there are different tests based on various symptoms. There are questionnaires on different issues like stress, depression, anxiety, substance abuse, memory and dementia...

Source: Times Of India
Read More

ADVERTISEMENT

Unknown

- Unknown Updated at: Wednesday, October 09, 2013

Pakistan's 'Earthquake Island' A Short Time Wonder Says Experts

Gwadar: A small island of mud and rock created by the huge earthquake that hit southwest Pakistan has fascinated locals but experts -- who found methane gas rising from it -- say it is unlikely to last long.

The 7.7-magnitude quake struck on Tuesday in Baluchistan's remote Awaran district, killing at least 271 people and affecting hundreds of thousands.

Off the coastline near the port of Gwadar, some 400 kilometres (250 miles) from the epicentre, locals were astonished to see the dark grey mass of rock and mud that had emerged from the waves in the Arabian Sea.

"It is not a small thing, but a huge thing which has emerged from under the water," Gwadar resident Muhammad Rustam told AFP.

"It looked very, very strange to me and also a bit scary because suddenly a huge thing has emerged from the water."

Enterprising boat owners were doing a brisk trade ferrying curious sightseers to the island -- dubbed "Earthquake Mountain" by locals.

Mohammad Danish, a marine biologist from Pakistan's National Institute of Oceanography, said a team of experts had visited the island and found methane gas rising.

"Our team found bubbles rising from the surface of the island which caught fire when a match was lit and we forbade our team to start any flame. It is methane gas," Danish said on GEO television news.

The island is about 60 to 70 feet (18 to 21 metres) high, up to 300 feet wide and up to 120 feet long, he said. It sits about 650 feet from the coast.

The surface was a solid but muddy mix of stones, sand and water with visible cracks, said an AFP cameraman who visited the island. Dead fish and sea plants lay on the surface.

Gary Gibson, a seismologist with Australia's University of Melbourne, said the new island was likely to be a "mud volcano", created by methane gas forcing material upwards during the violent shaking of the earthquake.

"It's happened before in that area but it's certainly an unusual event, very rare," Gibson told AFP, adding that it was "very curious" to see such activity some 400 kilometres from the quake's epicentre.

The so-called island is not a fixed structure but a body of mud that will be broken down by wave activity and dispersed over time, the scientist said.


A similar event happened in the same area in 1945 when an 8.1-magnitude earthquake at Makran triggered the formation of mud volcanoes off Gwadar.

Professor Shamim Ahmed Shaikh, chairman of the department of geology at Karachi University, said the island, which has not been officially named, would disperse within a couple of months.

Shared From Zee News

Unknown

- Unknown Updated at: Thursday, September 26, 2013