Mental health status of Farmers in Maharashtra, India: A study from farmer suicide prone area of Vidarbha region

Abstract

BackgroundIn India according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data 1, 31,666 people committed suicide and out of this 12,360 were farmers committed in 2014. When the suicide rate increases in a particular group in society, it is often an indicator that there are factors in the general environment which are placing selective pressure on the group in question. The present study examines the mental health status of Farmers in Maharashtra, India. MethodsThe cross-sectional study design was adopted to conduct this study. Three hundred (300) Household were selected for this study. The sample size was distributed proportionately in each village using Probability Proportional to size (PPS) sampling method. Households were stratified based on the loan amount to ensure that all types of borrower-farmers were included in the sample. The loan amounts were classified into three categories: up to Rs. 30,000, Rs. 31,000 to Rs. 60,000, and more than Rs. 60,000. Univariate, Bivariate and logistic regression analysis have been conducted. ResultsMore than half 58%of farmers have reported distress of mental health and 41.7% farmers were reported no distress of mental health in last two weeks. Mean of the mental health status of farmers is 0.58, and standard deviation (SD) is 0.49.The most commonly reported symptoms of mental health relate to anxiety and insomnia, with 55% of farmers suffering from this symptoms. The second highest ranking prevalence of symptoms is somatic problems (34.7%). ConclusionThe immediate clinical and non-clinical interventions should be initiated to mitigate the suicides among the farmers.