Let them subject their methods to scientific proof


WHAT are the causes of mental disorder?

Factors leading to mental disorder are many. Some are genetic and can be passed from one family member to another, especially the major psychiatric disorder. We also have some biological factors, especially in pregnant women, through difficult delivery; the child may have brain disorder when growing up. Any lifestyle that can cause disorder or assault to the brain is biological.

There are social and psychological issues. We live in an environment where we lack most social amenities; we spend hours in the traffic and return home to darkness. If you live that kind of life constantly, it will have bearing on the workings of your mind. But if you change that environment, you can see the difference when your life changes. Mental disorder can come as a result of all these factors.

Is there an orthodox cure for mental disorder?

It depends on the condition. There are different types of mental disorder. A patient may have generic mental disorder; grow up in a dysfunctional family with no support. Another patient may have a psychological disorder, maybe he didn’t get job on time and the two are in the peak of their mental disorder, their symptoms may appear similar but the causative factors are different and one will respond to treatment faster than the other. If the psychological case has a change of circumstances, he may not need to undergo treatment again, he will be well enough to be totally free, while the generic type may need to continue to take his drugs.

So generic mental disorders take much longer time to cure?

It makes the illness more severe. It depends on severity. Someone can be laughing at a patient who has mental disorder but if you look at him well, he may be having mental disorder. If you have sleep disorder and you have to be induced to sleep for more than two weeks, it is mental disorder. If you tell the thousands of people with that problem that they have mental disorder, they will deny. If I tell you the people we have managed-pastors, politicians, professionals, celebrities who have suffered mental disorder at some point and they are okay now. The people who have severe conditions are less than 10 percent of mental disorder patients.

Can the diabolical be responsible for mental disorder?

Some people believe that the cause is strictly spiritual like the step mum is responsible for the illness. What about the climes where they don’t practise polygamy, mental illness cuts across every race, gender, social economic group even in climes where they don’t believe in diabolical things? Let us not sweep everything under the banner of spiritual attack.

Are you saying mental disorder cannot be caused by supernatural or diabolical means?

Why do you have to single out mental disorder? What makes it so unique? Why not hypertension or diabetics?

Because we can explain hypertension to some extent or even expect it…

Does it mean what you cannot explain in our own realm must be supernatural?

So are you saying it is not possible for spiritual forces to be responsible for mental disorder?

You don’t rubbish people’s belief like that. Let’s look at it this way: some people believe whatever happens to you is the will of God, but does that excuse irresponsible behaviour and its consequences? We take everything that happens only on its spiritual face value; in the climes where things work, we see there is less emphasis on the spiritual.

So the cause of mental disorder should not be seen only through the spiritual. We see the importance of knowledge, the rate of child mortality has reduced in the last 30 years because of immunisation, and sicknesses that were ascribed to demons in the past are now eradicated. Real knowledge brings fact and it is dependable.

What is wrong with the traditional herbal treatment of mental disorder?

We are not saying all our herbal drugs or traditional things are horrible. After all, the drugs we use are synthetic, taken from herbs and roots, but when you keep your methods close to your chest, how can we verify the truth in it? We have patients that were brought from herbalists because the man was just giving orthodox drugs to the patient.

There was a herbalist who was using urine therapy and the patient ran back to the hospital. This is the problem we have with our people. If you are a herbalist, subject your methods to scientific experiment. If I prescribe a drug, it is open, the patients know the name and they can find out about it. But if you cannot show your methods openly, there is something fishy there.

All these people claiming to have the cure for mental disorder, I am not rubbishing them, but let them come together; let them refine it in a scientific way. If someone is making claims of curing mental disorder, look for patients who are roaming about naked, pack 20 of them, your organisation can do it as corporate social responsibility, give the patients to the herbalist, let him treat them for one year and let’s see how many of them have been totally cured. Then we can now say scientifically, that this man truly has a cure for mental disorder and his methods can be reproduced. We are not competing with the herbalists at all.

If they do that, they will lose their herbal secrets and how will they make money?

Then it means he is selfish. The company that produces the drugs we are using is making money; they should come together and patent their drugs. They will make their money and the world will know it is this person that has invented this drug. It’s not difficult, it must be evidence-based.

One herbalist said orthodox medicine only suppresses the disorder and does not cure it.

Here, we don’t just treat, we also manage them. There are psychologists and occupational therapists that would ensure that the patient is not exposed to the conditions that caused the initial mental disorder. We train them in handcrafts.

I have patients who have gone to become authors and those who are business people. They are doing well. Are you saying they are not totally cured? I have many high flying patients in all professions who have returned to their businesses and doing well, as long as they are still taking their medications.

Is there an end to the taking of drugs?

For some of them yes, just like a hypertensive patient still needs to take his medication. But for other cases like social or psychological mental disorder, such an individual may not need to take medications and you won’t know. As you are sitting there, I don’t know if you are taking medications, it’s not written on the face. The person sitting beside you may be a patient. So the duration varies just as the disorder varies.

What will be your advice to those who may have cases like this? Come to hospital or herbalist?

Take the patient to the hospital immediately. Don’t present late. When people have mental disorder, they should present it on time, many people shop around and hospitals are the last resort. That should not be so. When we have a problem, don’t let us be myopic and narrow our solution to spiritualism; look beyond that and ask yourself questions. You can pray and take action, but it is not a sin to come to the hospital.