‘Increased use of networking sites leading to psychiatric disorders’

Dr Parmod Gupta from Chandigarh spoke at length on the adjustment problems in the families and the increased stress due to the use of Facebook in the families. “This is resulting in marital disputes because couples fail to spend time with the family,” he added.

Dr Rajeev Gupta,organising chairman and president of the Indian Psychiatric Society,North Zone,said young psychiatrists had done a great job by making this speciality popular and reaching the unreached mentally ill people.

Dr Ajit Awasthi, Department of Psychiatry,PGIMER,and past president of the society,inaugurated the conference whose theme was ‘new challenges in psychiatry’. He said two decades back psychiatrists were very less and the focus was on the treatment of major psychiatric illnesses,and people were not aware of psychiatric disorders and used to think it a result of witchcraft or past life’s sins. Now more and more people sought psychiatric help.

Dr Deepak Gupta from Sir Ganga Ram Hospital in Delhi said youngsters these days suffered from a lot of stress due to peer pressure,increased burden of studies and increased parent expectations. Chief guest Ludhiana West MLA Bharat Bhushan Ashu,also spoke.