Suanprung Psychiatric Hospital

Today we went and visited Suanprung Psychiatric Hospital in Chiang Mai. This hospital has both outpatient and inpatient sections. There are 17 inpatient wards that have 20-25 patients per ward, males and females being seperated. There is also a pediatric ward for patients less than 15. They have the wards set up as big rooms with multiple beds lined up and one bathroom area that is shared, and the nurses station is on the outside looking in. Then we toured the inpatient and outpatient pharmacies and were told how they set up the medications for the patients. Currently for inpatient they set up a week at a time, but within the next month they are getting a robot to help package the medicine, which will then be a one day supply. It was interesting to see which medications are used in Thailand compared to the U.S, many of them being the same. Thailand uses more first generation antipsychotic medications while the U.S. uses more second generation.