In the likes of rural Thailand mental problems are seen to be caused as being possessed by bad spirits. It used to be, might be still, that the family would take the possessed person to a temple and have the monks literally beat the spirits out of the possessed person.
Not long after I came here in 2005 there was a case in the newspaper where the monks beat a young woman so badly that she was hospitalized due to the injuries the monks inflicted on her. Police became involved but I don't recall how the event ended.