Interviews with key members
From 14 till 21 January 2005 the well known Dutch journalist Ineke Jungschleger, advisor of the board of the MAD-Foundation, visited Bucharest and Timisoara on behalf of the MAD Foundation. There she has interviewed key-persons in Romanian psychiatry.
The goal of this project by the MAD Foundation was to paint a picture of the history and the current state of affairs of Romanian psychiatry as seen by important insiders. The interviews have been published in a booklet.
A number of conclusions were evident from the interviews:
- Even during the darkest years of dictatorship especially the professors Pamfil and Lazarescu from Timisoara were succesful in keeping up more or less with the development in the international psychiatry despite all repression.
- Psychiatry does not have any priority although a number of psychiatric diseases belong to the top ten of invalidating diseases.
- If or if not psychiatric institutes have been used during the communistic dictatorship to remove dissidents from the community, is not clear yet. Such traumatic facts are too painful to be discussed openly by mental health professionals
- Knowledge about and skills in non-biological techniques have increased a lot over the last ten years.
- Many times progressive professionals feel themselves helpless, when the authorities prevent - by lack of concern - the development of a broader psychiatry. Since decades the law makes these developments possible. They feel also not supported by the public opinion.
- A number of NGO’s (Non Governemental Organisations) has introduced new, necessary techniques for a modern, adequate psychiatry. When the NGO stops, the Romanian professionals continue the project for a longer or shorter time without the income of their necessary second job. They only stop when they can not longer afford the costs of the project. It is of prime importance that in the coming two pre-entry years (to the Europeen Union) the Romanian authorities and the Chamber of Insurance is made clear, that they have to guarantee the continuation of the payment of such costs.
- Everybody seems to know about corruption and bribery in Romania. Nobody ever writes or talks about the opposite: professionals support their poor patients.
- The construction of a special website is justified, because communication between professionals and between institutes - and even within institutes - lacks a lot. We hope that these interviews may be read by many participants in the field of psychiatry.
In October 2009 Jungschleger updated the interviews with Ileana Botezat, Mircea Lazarescu and Pompilea Dehelean – and she interviewed six other active reformers in the field of mental health care - Daniela Cocian, Camelia Doru, Ileana Stoica, Emil Bolcu, Florian Koleci and Simona Tamasan.
Martin Willems M.D., Psychiatrist
Read the interviews:
Ileana Botezat and Sanda Lepoiev
Dan Prelipcianu and Catalina Tudose
