The mental health of the Basque people deteriorates to the beat of the economic crisis.

-the atmosphere of pessimism and uncertainty is affecting to the environment ” society

– more than 400 experts in mental health of entire Spain met in Vitoria to discuss how work-related stress arising from the current economic situation affects mental health

Vitoria, March 2012.- work-related stress arising from the current economic situation is affecting the mental health of the Basque people. The loss of work and uncertainty about the possibility of losing it are causing a deterioration of mental health which manifests itself in depressions and anxieties.

These assessments have been conducted by Iñaki Egiluz, head of Psychiatry of the Hospital de Cruces, and Emmanuel Quejereta, Chief of the psychiatry service of the Donostia Hospital and member of the biomedical research centre in network of Mental Health (CIBERSAM), during the course of a press conference held in Vitoria in which stands the 20th update course in psychiatry.

The course brought together during 8 and 9 March more than 400 healthcare professionals working in the area of mental health of all Spain to treat how work-related stress arising from the current economic situation, personal relationships, gender-based violence and violence domesticthey are affecting the mental health of the Basque people.

The event is an annual meeting of national experts in Psychiatry in which the Apostle Santiago Hospital, the Psychiatric Hospital of Alava, the Department of neuroscience of the Faculty of Medicine of the University of the Basque country, the Department of health, Basque Government, and Osakidetza collaborate.

Pointed out the Chief of the psychiatry service of the Donostia Hospital that now ” there has been an increase in the number of depression and stress, but he has promised that in short term this incidence will increase because the economic crisis, according to forecasts, raged in the Basque country will be ”.

He has also indicated that in the Basque Autonomous Community the crisis is coming later than in other communities, but is coming, so that we we will suffer situations of economic need ”.

In this sense, has shown that many people are going to be suddenly unemployed and mental health professionals will begin to notice an increase in the number of cases that have stress as a source ”.

For its part, Querejeta said that the loss of employment makes some people that are healthy, but who are most vulnerable, can enter into depression and mild mental pathologies express ”.

Precisely, this change in the environment of the Basques will be the central focus of the event. So, last Friday, March 9, Dr. José Romero-Urcelay, clinical director of the Department of hospital Broadmoor (England) personality disorders, offered a presentation in which stressed that the lack of economic resources in families and the adverse conditions for the care of its membersthey are triggers of domestic violence, both for women and for children and the elderly.

On the other hand, during the 20th Edition of the update course in psychiatry specialists also addressed issues such as violence in general, both domestic (who ensures that physical and sexual offenders, frequently present, possessive controllers feature) as the social; the disorder and hypochondriasis (worry, fear of or the idea of serious disease, from misinterpretation of symptoms or bodily functions) body dysmorphic, i.e. concern for imaginary or exaggerated defects of appearance; climate change, prevention strategies; innovative biological treatments, pathological gambling or biological determinants are issues addressed at the meeting.