BOOKS THE MENTAL HEALTH OF THE MAORI

Te Ao Hou, December 1958, Page 57

This article, specially written for ‘Te Ao Hou’, brings to light many important new facts and opinions on the mental health of the Maori. BOOKS THE MENTAL HEALTH OF THE MAORI by Dr. F. McDONALD (Porirua Hospital) Review of: Mental Health in New Zealand by Prof. E. Beaglehole The problem of mental ill-health is one of great topical interest in New Zealand at present. Groups are being formed, newspapers are thundering, so it was with pleasant anticipation that one began this book, hoping it would state the issues foursquare and form a stimulating springboard for-discussion. It is excellently produced by a Wellington firm and the type is very clear. In the unchanged second edition, which appeared recently, Dr Beaglehole, Professor of Psychology at Victoria University, has put forward a number of good ideas for a regeneration of our Mental Health Services. He stresses the need for much more emphasis on clinics for the treatment of mentally disturbed children with which one can agree heartily. However, with some other aspects of the book one is forced to disagree just as heartily, first and foremost in the field in which the author has done a large amount of painstaking research, namely in the field of Maori illhealth. For instance, on the first page he states that the incidence of mental disorder for Maoris is “… 64 per 100,000 as compared with the pakeha figure of 105 per 100,000 … [also] … a psychoneurotic percentage of 4 while the pakeha has 14; in the senile category the pakeha percentage is 16 while that of the Maori is 8.” These figures certainly seem to bear out his contention that the Maori is less afflicted with mental disease than the pakeha. They are taken from admission figures to Mental Hospitals. But let us see what that really means. He divides mental illness into five categories: 1. Behaviour disorders, e.g., children who are difficult to control, are aggressive, unresponsive to thrashings, beatings, etc. “Teddy boys” in fact. 2. Character disorders, e.g., sexual perversions, compulsive stealing, lying, drug addiction, alcoholism. 3. Psychosomatic disorders, e.g., so-called bodily diseases in which disturbed emotions are of great importance: indigestion, peptic ulcer, asthma, rheumatism. 4. Minor personality disorders: The psychoneuroses—“nerves” with excessive fear, guilt, depression, obsessional thoughts to a pathological degree. 5. Major personality disorders: The psychoses, e.g., legal insanity, suicidal depression, “hearing voices”, wildly manic and illogical behaviour. An important part of our mental health services is played by psychiatric nurses, and more and more Maori girls are taking up this profession. They are highly spoken of at the mental hospitals where they serve. Nurse P. N. Patate (above) comes from Masterton and had wide experience in ordinary and maternity nursing before she joined Porirua Hospital recently. (National Publicity photograph)