Slices of bread made by a small group of patients of the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) are now served as part of a meal for patients admitted to the Government Kilpauk Medical College (KMC) Hospital.
At IMH, the bakery is one of the Industrial Therapy Centres (ITC) where patients, who are improving with treatment, are engaged in baking bread, and at times, cakes and biscuits too. Already, bread made by patients is supplied internally at IMH. Earlier, they were supplying bread to the ESI Hospital in Ayanavaram.
“We have started to supply bread for patients admitted to KMC from Sunday. The bread packets are sent to the hospital at 7.30 a.m. every day,” IMH director P. Poorna Chandrika said.
At present, five or six in-patients of IMH along with two outpatients who were discharged from the institute, are engaged at the bakery.
“We make and supply 218 packets, each consisting of 400 g of bread slice, for patients in IMH every day. This is provided for breakfast along with milk. For KMC, we are supplying 570 to 600 packets of bread. Each packet has a 200 g sliced sweet bread. We have printed ‘Industrial Therapy Centre, IMH, Chennai’ on the packet along with the date of packing and use by date,” said S. Ambika, social welfare officer, IMH.
The number of packets required by KMC depends on the number of patients admitted each day. “We pay ₹4,000 to ₹4,500 for the two outpatients working in the bakery. For our patients, we provide canteen tokens. Sometimes, if they need anything else such as footwear, we purchase it for them,” she added. There were plans to train more in-patients to work in IMH bakery.
Apart from the bakery, IMH has separate ITCs in art and craft, tailoring for women and gardening for both women and men. Some patients were trained to work in the medical records department of the hospital.
V. Venkatesh Mathan Kumar, professor, IMH, explained how the stigma attached to persons with mental disabilities comes in the way of them securing jobs. “When patients are involved in work at the ITCs, their disability reduces. When they gain by working, it improves their self-esteem, gives them a moral boost and instills positivity. Learned behaviour happens when other patients observe them,” he said.
