Department of Psychiatry & Mental Health: Overview

The Department provides services to adults, as well as offering emergency services. The inpatient ward and emergency ward is complemented by outpatient services.

The facilities and professional staff are closely integrated with the Associated Psychiatric Hospital platform at Valkenburg and Lentegeur Hospitals, as well as the Child and Family Psychiatric Unit at the Red Cross Hospital. Consultant staff from Lentegeur Hospital have been appointed to the department teaching staff as part of a joint staff arrangement; this has contributed to the continuation of service provision at all levels of training and care.

Alcoholism and addiction services are dealt with by the out-patients department. Emergency and detoxification procedures are undertaken at the Psychiatric Emergency Unit.

Various studies are conducted with collaboration from international partners, including research into:

• primary mental health service projects in Khayalithsha,


• adolescent psychiatric disorders


• the genetics of schizophrenia.

The Department is also a partner in two European-Commission funded projects together with several partners in Africa and Europe.