Stigma and Attitude toward Mentally Ill Among a sample of non-medical staff working in Psychiatric Hospitals. A transcultural study

People with mental disorders face stigma, discrimination and marginalization in most societies . Attitudes influence both professional and personal behavior. In particular, stigma and discrimination associated with mental illness results in the under-use of mental health services. Objectives: Studying the attitude towards the mentally ill among non medical employees in psychiatric hospitals in two different countries Egypt (group A) and Kuwait (group B). Investigating whether or not working in Psychiatric Hospitals can affect the attitudes to those patients and whether or not there stands a cultural difference in such attitudes. Methodology: Non medical psychiatric staff working in hospital; a total number of 347 employees and workers participated in the study, while the number of drop outs was about 46 employees who refused to complete the interview. All subjects fulfilled the following: Fahmy and El-Sherbini Social Classification and Assessment of attitudes towards mental illnesses using (CAMI) scale. Results: It was noticed that higher CAMI scores were found in group B and there was a very highly statistical significance between both groups regarding total scores, fear and exclusion and goodwill. Regarding correlation with various demographic data revealed the following age was not differing statistically in both groups, Sex was found to have a statistical significance in group A concerning social control (p=0.04) and fear and exclusion scores in group B (p=0.007). Education was found to influence social control in group A (p=0.007) and influencing all the subscales of CAMI in group B. Professional workers including nurses and security team were found to have a positive effect on attitude evident in scoring less in fear and exclusion subscale and was statistically different in both group A and B (p=0.03; 0.000) respectively; also occupation influences the total scores in group B (p=0.007) and influence good will in both groups. Finally social class revealed that higher social class individuals hold a better attitude than other classes in both groups. Conclusion: general public’s view about mental illness is largely unfavorable, the study revealed that attitude of non medical employees in psychiatric hospital toward mentally ill patients is not better than general public attitude despite their continuous contact with this category of patients. Education about mental illness and fighting stigma which affect attitudes of people toward mentally ill is highly needed.