Winner of the 2013 edition of the Miss eXcel Plus pageant, Egyirba Armstrong Mensah has paid a day’s familiarization visit to the Accra Psychiatric Hospital.

Miss Armstrong’s visit to the facility was to find out for herself the many challenges it faced and what she could do to help.

Chief Director of the Accra Psychiatric Hospital, Dr. Osei who hosted her, underscored the importance of raising the standard of facility to an appreciable level, adding “we are all at risk of getting a mental problem.

“We can all have mental illness; it is really not far from us, it is nothing to run away from. Mental illness is not just caused by smoking weed or having your heart broken as people believe. It can be as a result of several other things,” he said.

“Ghanaians have a different perception about people with mental problem or illness which is very bad,” he adds.

“A person can dress very descent, but will be having a very serious mental problem therefore that idea people have created about people suffering from this illness should be stopped.

“We are very happy with Miss Armstrong’s visit and will be so glad to work with the beauty queen who has chosen our hospital and mental health as something she wants to support.”

Mensah said she was glad to have chosen the plight of the mentally challenged as her project, pledging her commitment to help finding a lasting solution to the institution’s many problems, and also to the general administration of mental health care in Ghana.

“I am very glad I chose this as my project and I decided on this because, my brother was once a victim of this illness four months ago.

“A doctor injected him of anti-rabies injection, so he was brought here and Dr. Osei took care of him. “My brother is now fit and he really inspired me to choose this project.

“My mission for this visit is to familiarize with the chief and the whole mental hospital, identify problems and help get solutions.”

A fruitful exercise it was, the beauty queen also toured some wards of the facility.