Chennai, Sept 28( BPNS)
The 104 Health Helpline constituted by the Tamil Nadu government to counsel students who have taken the National Eligibility Cum Entrance Test (NEET) has found that anxiety level is high in students who have repeated the examination. The counsellors said that of the students who recorded a higher level of anxiety, 60 to 70 percent were students who have repeated the NEET.
The 104 health helpline was constituted by the Tamil Nadu government after three students committed suicides in three days. While one student took the extreme step on the day of the NEET , two others took their life after the exam in consecutive days.
After this the health department constituted a helpline in which counsellors would reach out to all the 1,10, 971 aspirants from Tamil Nadu who took the NEET- UG examination.
The state has engaged 60 psychologists and 25 psychiatrists for the purpose of providing counselling to these students. The number of all the 1,10,971 students were collected and they were contacted.
Periyasamy,a psychologist who is with the 104 health helpline while speaking to BPNS said, “A large number of students who took the NEET exam were found to be tense and of this, we could find that the maximum tensed students were those who have taken the repeaters test. The repeaters generally devote the entire year to prepare for the exam by skipping their regular classes and hence they would be very tense after appearing for the examination.”
The counsellors said that 200 students were categorised as ‘High Risk’ and the counsellors are in regular touch with them to prevent them from any extreme step.
Dr Sarvanan, Chief of 104 health helpline while speaking to BPNS said, “ Of the 1,10,971 NEET aspirants, 45000 did not respond to our repeated calls, but we will continue to call and try and counsel them.”
He said that all students would again be contacted and this process will continue till the students respond to the calls. He said that the calls would continue till the exam results are out.
Dr Venkitesh Madankumar, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Institute of Mental Health, Chennai while speaking to BPNS said, “Some students are taking the exam easily and they said that if they could not crack this, would opt for some other carrier. However, 15 per cent of the students said that medicine was their life.
Counsellors also said that some students who have appeared for the first time are also very tense and according to statistics these students are those who are from socially and economically weaker backgrounds. High performance in state board examinations, and from poor backgrounds who were not able to get proper coaching is tense of the results.
Dr. Saravanan said, “Most of such students would be first-time graduates of their families and they experience more tension. Counsellors are contacting high-risk students every alternate day and we are also in touch with their parents.”
He also said that the details of these students are provided to the district administrations where they live and officials would visit the homes of these students.
Dr Rajani. U.V, Professor of Psychiatry, Madurai Government Medical College while speaking to BPNS said, “ The students have to be properly taught that Medicine is not the end of life nor this examination and they have high potentials and that they can try other areas if they were not able to crack the examinations. It has to be communicated to them.”
At 104 , the counsellors said that most of the students who are tensed want someone to listen to their issues. A psychologist while speaking to BPNS said, “We are convincing them that we are there to listen to them and would sort out their problems.”
