Male, female psychiatric patients share same ward

Relatives of the psychiatric patients who spoke to Chronicle said some of the patients would strip and lie bare in front of other patients of a different sex.
“I don’t think what is happening at Gweru Provincial Hospital is inadmissible. How can patients of different sexes share a hospital ward? To make matters worse, some of these patients go to the extent of stripping naked in front of their male or female colleagues and I don’t think this is good,” said a resident with a relative admitted at the hospital.
The relative said she was considering withdrawing her female relative at the institution after discovering that she was sharing the same ward with male psychiatric patients.
“The situation subjects female patients to sexual abuse. There is no way they can be rehabilitated under such conditions,” she said.
Sources at the health institution said some of the psychiatric patients were at times caught being intimate.
“It has been happening for some time. We have caught many of them indulging in sexual intercourse.
“I think this is because some of the medication they get enhances sexual appetite,” said the source within the hospital.
Contacted for comment, acting medical superintendent for the hospital, Dr Fungai Makwarimba, said the psychiatric patients were only sharing the same building but were accommodated at different wings.
He said male and female psychiatric patients were only allowed to mingle in the same ward during the day as part of their rehabilitation.
“The problem is that those outside the system do not know how we operate.
“Our patients in the psychiatric ward are not sharing the same ward. The wing they are accommodated at has two wards, that separates male and female patients,” he said.
Dr Makwarimba said there were nurses operating around the clock in the wards monitoring the patients as they mingle during the day.
“We have nurses who are always in the wards especially from the female wing.
“They would be monitoring our patients as they mingle during the day as part of the rehabilitation,” he said.