Mental Health Recovery - Essay Example

This is referred to as the process of recovery. The term recovery covers both the external and internal conditions. Internal conditions include a person’s attitude, experiences and the processes involved in a person’s recovery procedures. External conditions comprise of events, circumstances, policies and practices that may facilitate the recovery procedures. Depending on the level of the mental illness, the condition may either be reversible or irreversible. Mild mental illnesses may be tackled easily.

The recovery procedure means the embracing of both the internal and external conditions. To boost the internal conditions of a patient four factors are nurtured; hope, healing, connection and empowerment. Hope is the most basic level to recovery. Patient should believe that they will get better. Hope also enables the patient to accept there is a problem, commitment to change, focus on his strengths rather than weaknesses and embracing the smallest change rather than expecting an overnight healing.

Healing does not necessarily refer to cure; however, it reinstates the state on normalcy to functionality. Healing processes gives the patients more hope and the strength to fight. Lack of empowerment gives mental patients the feeling of helplessness, lack of control and dependency (Crowley, 2000). Empowerment plays a major role to recovery; in that patients are enabled to be dependent; thus, increasing their mental strength. Connection is the final process of internal recovery. It connects the patient’s conditions to the outside world which helps him to relate more with the normal world.

This includes the occupation, relationship and social status. External conditions mainly involve the general culture of healing and the application of healing programs towards a patient. A positive culture of healing is enabled by the society at large; this is made possible by the application of human rights which advocates for minimization of stigma and non discrimination of mental disabled patients. Their rights are protected by the provision of equal opportunities in employment, education and housing.

The relationship between the internal and external factors in healing is crucial in mentally ill patient’s life (Jacobson & Curtis, 2000). For instance, the abolition of stigma positively influences the internal self stigmatization. It gives them the feeling of acceptance and normalcy. This makes the recovery easier, faster and more efficient or permanent. In some instances, there is the mental condition called Schizophrenia. It is characterized by poor emotional response and a breakdown of thoughts.

Its symptoms are dysfunctional speech and thoughts, delusions and hallucinations. This can also be treated with the adherence of the external and internal conditions. However, its preferable treatment is the use of antipsychotic medication. It mostly affects teenagers, and it is mainly caused by substance abuse (American Psychiatric Association, Task Force on DSM-IV, 2000) There is the ACT (Assertive Community Treatment) report which allows the evaluation of the extent of which the ACT treatments is achieving their goals in supporting people with severe mental illnesses.

The ACT reports provide information on persons healing from illnesses, ACT services and characteristics of persons undergoing the treatment (Paterson, 2010). Apart from the social treatment, there is also the medical treatment. In most cases, the drugs involved