Psychologist appointment every 6 months for students in 20 Delhi govt schools

These health clinics—which are essentially an extension of the government flagship ‘mohalla clinics’—have been set up in 20 government schools on a pilot basis, and each school will be staffed with one ‘school health clinic assistant’ or nurse, and one psychologist. One doctor will be available for every five clinics and will visit each, once a week. These clinics are to be used exclusively by the students of that school and they will be operational during school hours. Like the newer mohalla clinics introduced by the government, these too will operate from porta cabins installed on the school premises.

Every day, at least 30 children will be screened at each clinic in which the nurse will ask them questions that may help identify issues, and each student will undergo a blood sugar and haemoglobin test. In case of irregularities, the children will be referred to the doctor.

“The idea is complete health check-up and treatment of children in one place. Twice a year children will undergo a complete health check-up in which all their parameters will be checked. Now for instance it is coming out that BMI is low in many children – 20-25% of children are showing up as underweight, anaemia is also common. Eye problems are also identified very late… Eyes and hearing will be checked, blood tests will be conducted… I hope to scale it up as well, and we will open these in every government school,” said health minister Satyendar Jain.

The psychologists will conduct sessions with groups and individual students. The current system is for students to be referred to the psychologist either by the nurse who may identify the need during the health screening or by teachers who may notice behaviours that indicate a child might need the psychologist’s treatment. However, during the inauguration of one such centre in Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya Moti Bagh, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia stated that this should be modified to be more universal.

“Introducing the psychologist is a very big step… In six months every child will interact with a psychologist at least once. It should not be that the big value addition you have made, by introducing a psychologist, makes it seem like there are ‘some children’ who need psychological treatment. It’s not like this. In society, you will find it hard to find anybody who doesn’t need any kind of psychological treatment and this is especially important in childhood… Let nurses or teachers not decide. Let the psychologist meet all of them every six months, and then decide if they require a therapist or are fit for continuing in the same way,” he said.

He also suggested that the psychologist conduct regular sessions with teachers.

“I also request that in every one or two months, at least initially, the psychologist should have an interaction with all teachers in school. Because teachers even now are not fully aware of mental health, they don’t have the full knowledge to understand and deal with it sensitively,” he said.