Reporter Wu Han of Extreme News
Hello everyone, I am Jiang Zhendong, Secretary of the Clinical Psychology Department Party Branch and Director at Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan. As a medical worker, I have always been dedicated to helping patients build a psychological defense line and let the sunshine into everyone’s heart.
The Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan where I work is a large Grade III hospital with a history of 111 years. The hospital is structured as “One Body, Three Districts, and Six Wings”, with 2 academician work studios, 26 provincial and municipal clinical key specialties, a Neurology Diagnosis and Treatment Center, a clinical medical research center for severe respiratory therapy in Wuhan, designated by the Wuhan city government as a characteristic development direction for cerebrovascular diseases.
Let the sunshine into the children’s hearts
First, I want to share a little story with you.
“I will be forever grateful to you!” Not long ago, I received a text message from a patient.
This patient is a young man, always strong-willed since childhood. Due to excessive pressure from the postgraduate entrance examination, he experienced depressive emotions. After the evaluation by me and my team, we convinced him to be hospitalized for treatment. To facilitate his studying, I even lent him my office as a study room and provided him with targeted medication treatment, assisted with transcranial magnetic stimulation for anti-compulsion, and conducted systematic desensitization and anti-compulsion and depression psychological therapy. To minimize the impact on his study, after nearly two months of treatment, that efficient, lively, confident young man returned. On the day of the entrance exam, I personally drove Xiao Wen to the exam venue. Later on, I received his thank-you message, which made the whole department very happy, calling him a “graduate who came out of the psychiatric ward”.
Actually, I face many patients in the mental aspect every day. I often tell them that it’s okay, you’ve just encountered a psychological “cold”, and if it can be discovered and intervened in a timely manner, you can emerge from the gloom.
Our job is to accompany children through the storms, learn to listen, empathize with them, and let the sunshine into their hearts.
This is also the career I have insisted on in the past decade: establishing a medical-school collaboration mechanism, opening up a psychological emergency “green channel”, and setting up a psychological defense line for the mental health of teenagers.
I have always believed that as material life in society becomes richer, college students are facing more psychological problems, but the overall awareness of mental health in society is still lacking and needs to be further enhanced.
Going back to the end of 2011, I received a psychological crisis call from a severely depressed college student, rushed to the scene, but what I saw was a lively life already gone.
The scene of extreme parental breakdown deeply touched me. I felt regretful and helpless at that time, but the responsibility and mission of a physician kept reminding me that I must do something for the teenagers in such situations. Therefore, I immediately positioned my career direction in preventing and treating psychological disorders in adolescents.
I submitted an application to the hospital, established the Psychology Department at the Nanhu branch, and targeted college students as the service target.
At that time, many psychological counseling centers in colleges in Hongshan and Nanhu were under construction. I rode a bicycle to contact the schools, often having to cross farmland and construction sites. When there was no road in some places, I had to carry my bicycle over hills.
My colleagues and I visited schools one by one.
During those years, we almost visited all the major universities around the hospital on foot, impressing teachers and students with persistence and sincerity.
Over the past decade, my team and I have been committed to holding free clinics and giving lectures on campus, providing psychological counseling services to college students.
Through various effective forms of promotion and service, teachers and students have a better understanding of the importance of mental health, improving self-prevention awareness. Subsequently, our work at universities has become more and more smooth, with some schools even inviting us to set up services on their campuses.
Now, we have established an efficient collaboration model of “scheduled appointments during normal times, quick emergency responses” with 45 universities in Wuhan, helping over 113,000 students and faculty, conducting over 180 free mental health knowledge lectures, screening more than 18,000 individuals for mental health issues. We have been highly recognized and welcomed by university students and faculty. We also collaborate with 25 communities to provide psychological screenings and emergency interventions for those in need. Furthermore, to help college students have the awareness and capacity to seek help for mental illness, and provide timely assistance and support for mental health issues, we have launched a 24-hour helpline available year-round to serve college students anytime, anywhere.
Establishment of the Academician Work Studio
I don’t pride myself on treating how many young people, but on enabling more young people to avoid treatment, is the service tenet I have adhered to for many years.
In 2012, under the guidance of the hospital party committee’s party building work, I organized the “Mental Health – A New Beginning” volunteer service team, which hosted the first provincial community health science popularization live broadcast room on mental health knowledge, reaching over 2 million viewers.
Later on, we also launched a 24-hour psychological counseling hotline and established a medical-school collaboration model of “scheduled appointments during normal times, immediate response in emergencies”, creating a green channel for psychological emergencies.
For over a decade, I have led the team to hold free clinics on campuses, give lectures, and conduct deep-reaching volunteer activities for college students’ mental health. Both online and offline, we have helped over 300,000 students and faculty, held more than 180 free mental health lectures, screened over 18,000 individuals for mental issues, successfully helping over 1,000 young people return to the classroom. My mental health popular science work, “Mental Forecast”, won the third prize in the Wuhan Science Popularization Competition. Currently, we have established a platform for mental health services for middle and high schools in the districts of Hongshan, Nanhu, and Hanjiang, serving over 16,000 students and faculty annually, screening over 12,000 for mental health issues. Our team has been honored as the “Best Volunteer Service Organization” and “Top Ten Volunteer Service Projects” in Wuhan.
For over ten years, my team and I have continuously upgraded this mental health service network with persistence and dedication.
We have established the “Mental Health – A New Beginning” volunteer service team, collaborating with volunteer teams led by Professor He Jinbo from Central China Normal University, volunteer teams from Huazhong Agricultural University, and other universities to conduct deep-reaching volunteer activities for college students’ mental health.
In 2020, Professor Lu Lin, a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Dean of Peking University Sixth Hospital, planned to set up a studio in Wuhan and was impressed with the “Mental Health” network I and my team had built. Eventually, the nation’s first “Professor Lu Lin Post-Epidemic Syndrome Studio” was established at Wuhan Wuchang Hospital.
The following year, leveraging the academician work studio, the first youth mental health outpatient clinic in Wuhan was inaugurated at Wuchang Hospital, providing treatment for adolescent learning disorders, sleep disorders, internet addiction, and more. Currently, the first psychological specialty building in a comprehensive medical institution in the province has been completed and put into operation at Wuchang Hospital.
Not only do we follow the treatment concepts of academician counterparts, but we also benchmark national standards in medical quality and research. Three members of the academician team are stationed in Wuhan, conducting research on light therapy alongside our medical professionals, allowing more children to bathe their psychology in sunlight.
Guided by the example of the academician work studio, I lead the team to continually update treatment concepts, uphold national standards in medical quality and research, aiming to create a provincial-level demonstration model of a psychiatric psychology specialty with a more beautiful environment and more complete facilities, weaving a tight psychological “protection net” for the public.
According to statistics, we have helped over 800 young people successfully return to the classroom. Additionally, we actively explore auxiliary employment, encouraging young patients to open online shops, teaching them how to run a business and communicate effectively, selling self-made handicrafts online to boost their confidence, self-esteem, enhance daily living skills, and social abilities, receiving unanimous praise from patients’ families.
Earlier this year, the East Wing Surgical Center at the hospital was officially put into use, offering a modern, professional, and intelligent design for a more comfortable medical experience for patients.
Recently, our hospital has been upgraded to a Grade III hospital, marking a comprehensive improvement in the hospital’s medical, educational, and research capabilities, achieving a historic breakthrough on the path to pursuing high-quality development, and preparing to create a new development pattern for the hospital.
In accordance with the “Healthy China 2030” plan and the Hubei province’s “323” action plan to enhance public mental health literacy, and ensure public mental health, I organized the launch of a series of public community health science live broadcasts addressing mental health, educating the public face-to-face on mental health knowledge.
During the 14th Five-Year Plan period, Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan will accelerate the implementation of the development strategy of “Quality Wuchang, Strength Wuchang, Innovation Wuchang, Wisdom Wuchang, Talent Wuchang, and Humanity Wuchang,” striving to establish 2,000 beds, toward the vision of becoming a domestically leading and internationally influential medical center, creating an international regional medical center of excellence.
This year marks the 75th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. I will continue to root myself in Yangyuan, adhere to the original mission of “putting people’s health at the center”, continuously improve service quality, provide lifelong care for the public’s health, and make a rightful contribution to the health of Wuchang, Wuhan, and the health of the people. I am a psychologist, Jiang Zhendong, and I advocate for attention to the mental health of young people, assisting in their robust growth, and allowing the sunshine to shine into every child’s heart.
(Source: Extreme News)
