St. Giles Hospital Medical Superintendent Doctor Balram Pandit

St. Giles Hospital Medical Superintendent Doctor Balram Pandit has stressed the need to have a specified ward for substance abuse patients.

Dr. Pandit told FBC News that the bulk of the cases in the substance abuse category that they are seeing at the hospital are associated with either marijuana abuse or meth use.

He says there are no specific medicines for these two substances to decrease the craving or prevent relapse across the globe.

Dr. Pandit says ideally he would like to keep these patients in a specified ward for long-term care to train them on how they can live a more disciplined life away from craving for illegal substances.

He says this ward is not available at the moment but is something they are pursuing.

“This cannot be done when you keep them just for, you know, a few weeks; generally, you keep them for a few months, and that ranges from, you know, six months to one year. So you need to keep them in the rehab facility at least for that long, and you need to, you know, make them practice a particular routine life.”

Dr. Pandit says when this support is provided to these patients, they will become changed people when they leave the facility.

He says they will start to see the world and the things in life from different perspectives and will be able to implement new coping skills when faced with stress or other problems in life.