By Sami Al-Mighmasi

Okaz/Saudi Gazette

MADINAH — The Health Ministry is planning to establish clinics and wards for psychiatric patients in government-run general hospitals, sources in the ministry said.

They said the ministry was also planning to establish 14 de-addiction centers all over the Kingdom.

The expansion of psychiatric treatment to general hospitals was within the ministry’s efforts to consolidate the concept of mental health within society.

The sources said as many as 400,000 psychiatric patients annually seek treatment at 21 specialist hospitals and centers, which together have a capacity of 4,046 beds, 99 clinics and 728 psychiatrists.

They said the hospitals and centers have a total workforce of 3,346 nurses and about 2,000 social workers.

The ministry has lately changed the name of psychological clinics to “comprehensive guidance clinics” so as to remove apprehensions of psychological patients in visiting them.

Meanwhile, informed sources expected the Madinah Specialist Hospital to become fully operational in June and said the emergency ward of the hospital would be open in April.

The hospital occupies an area of 350,000 square meters and will have a capacity of 300 beds.