Social Work Perspective in Mental Health - Essay Example

?Social Work Perspective in Mental Health Social construct of mental health Mental illness has been identified as a socially constructed illness due to several reasons that have been brought forward, some of those reasons include the following; one is that mental illnesses are considered as socially undesirable behaviours. The means of judgement that are used to make diagnosis on most mental health disorders are not medically but socially and ethnically based which means that those that do not behave according to the social expectations of them are considered misfits. This idea has developed over a period of time with illnesses such as ‘madness’ being coined in the 19th century, in this period there was increase in hospitals and asylums that were dedicated to people suffering from mental complications; however, not only mad people were put I to these hospitals and asylums but everyone who was considered to be deviant . Putting the mad people and those considered to have other mental challenges in these facilities was used as a tool for social control and maintaining order in the society since individuals were taken there to be moulded into individuals who could be accepted back into the community (Australian Association of Social Workers (AASW) 2008, p22). In the recent past the occurrence of ADHD has increased and what is considered as ‘normal’ in childhood behaviour is controlled by health experts such as psychiatrists and psychologists by defining what is socially acceptable and what is not socially acceptable. The terms that are associated with mental orders such as crazy, mad, mentally ill, mentally challenged, bonkers, coo-coo-bananas and demented are nowadays used as casual insults rather than medical terms. Models of mental health Individuals are characterized as mentally ill depending on two elements; one of the elements is feeling, which refers to the levels of psychic distress and pain that an individual with mental illnesses experience, the second element is the functionality, which refers to the capacity or lack of it to coordinate resources in a desired or adaptive way. Using these elements, there are four models of mental health that can be derived from them. The first model is the of mental health is the spiritual perspective; since long ago, the consciousness and normal behaviour of an individual has been linked with a supernatural powers, religious forces have explained that there are bad and good forces in the world. Suffering from mental health disorders has been associated with being possessed by the evil forces or falling out of favour with the good forces. This usually happens as a result of an individual committing sin or a morally wrong action. Using this model to treat mental health cases, social workers try to use the religious expectations in treating a client, this may involve them advising the client to maintain morality and avoid cases of sin, which may have caused the mental disturbances (Bailey, 2012, p91). The second model that can be used to explain mental health disorders is the moral character; the moral character perspective has mainly been adopted from the Greek philosophers; this perspective is based on the notion that the society expects an individual to develop certain virtues failure to which he is considered as having some mental challenges. For instance, a society expects that an individual should have virtues such as courage, honesty, integrity and fortitude among other virtues, therefore, if an individual lacks all or some of these virtues, he may be considered to have some mental health challenges. Approach to such a case among mental health social workers will mainly involve working with the client to develop the virtues that the society expects him to have, in addition, the social health workers may work with the family to avoid stigmatization of the individual, which may discourage him from attempting to develop the virtues (Renouf & Bland, 2005, p428). The third model of mental health is uses biological and neurophysiological aspects, which is based on the fact that a human being consists of natural functions that have been designed by nature; a mental illness is caused by the breakdown of the neurophysiological system of the human body. Social workers in mental health are concerned with the conditions that led to development of the neuropsychological breakdown and therefore work to remove those conditions in order to improve the mental condition of the patient (Weick, Rapp, Sullivan & Kisthardt, 1989, p350). This therefore means that the social workers will have to know the background of the patient in order to understand the cause of the disease and recommend the ideal post-therapy conditions that a client should be kept in for complete healing or to avoid recurrence of the condition. The fourth model that can be used to explain mental illnesses is learning and developmental (psychological); this is based on the theory that a person develops in a way that he is always trying to adapt to the environment (Martin, 2011, p94). If the individual fails to adapt in the expected way or develops the wrong processes, then he is likely to suffer or have a mental dysfunction. Social workers in mental health are responsible for helping the clients adapt to the environment; in addition, they also help them to reform from the negative responses that an individual may have developed in the course of his developmental process. The fifth model in explanation of mental illness is the sociological system; this system focuses on the macro structures of power and resources, the social definition of what behaviours define mental disorders and how the cases of mental disorders are treated and distributed (Bland, Renouf & Tullgren, 2009, 74). Social workers in mental health are therefore concerned with educating the communities and families of the affected people on the treatments available locally to help improve the quality of life of people suffering from mental disorders (Petrila, Sadoff, 1992, 137; Burdekin, 1989, 114). In addition they are also responsible for reducing the stigma that people with mental disorders face by showing the people around the client the importance of embracing him and helping him in the healing process. Mental Health Status and Assessment tool Psychological measure Tools and description Number of items and format Age group Administration Psychometric properties Metal health update and surveillance Bright future surveillance questions Unlimited 0-21yrs Variable Open ended questions that involve participatory care Bright future previsit and supplementary questionnaires Unlimited 0-21yrs variable Yes/no questions that invite participatory care and help determine care for further counselling Guidance for adolescent prevention services questionnaires 72 items for younger adolescents, 61 items for older adolescents, 15 items for parents(Jacobson & Greenley, 2001, p483) Parent, young teenagers and older teenagers N/A Home, Education/employment, activities, drugs, sexuality, suicide/depression, safety Part of interview Table 1: Mental health screening and assessment tool Available at Strategies that can be used to intervene in cases of mental health problems depend on the type of disorders that an individual have, below are some of the disorders and the possible interventions Personality disorders is another issue in mental health which influences the behaviour of individuals over a time period, in some instances however personality is not considered as a mental disorder (Eaton, 2012, p110). Personality disorders have been found to start in childhood and develop as person grows. These disorders have an implication on the social workers in that they have to have to know how a patient was brought up and the environment that he grew in, this will be able to help them understand the causes of the personality disorder therefore know the right treatment for them. Since the parenting style has been changing in the recent past with most of the parents who are working having to leave their child in the hands of Nannies, the close parental care that the children used to receive is no more (Bland & Renouf, 2001, p241). The social workers need to understand how the personality of children brought up by nannies differs from the children who are brought up by their parents so that they can be able to advice parents on how to bring up their children in order to avoid the personality disorders that start during childhood (Noordsy et al, 2000, 44). Eating disorders are the other type of disorders that are usually caused by paying too much attention to food and weight and they include anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating (European Ministerial Conference on Mental Health, World Health Organization & Who European Ministerial Conference on Mental Health 2005 p65). Due to the changing dietary characteristics in the world, the effect of these disorders has been changing especially in the developed world where the number of obese people has been increasing. Social health workers who deal with mental health should therefore be able to come up with ways on how to change the perception of the patients on food in order to improve their eating habits and therefore mitigate the effects caused by the eating disorders (Weick, Rapp, Sullivan & Kisthardt, 1989, p350). Sexual and gender identity disorders are other issues in mental health that disrupt the ability of an individual to engage in normal sexual activities or cause an individual to have problems with his or her gender (Merighi, Ryan, Renouf & Healy, 2005, p92). Some of the disorders in this category include dyspareunia, ego-dystonic homosexuality and gender identity disorders. Social worker therefore need to understand what factors lead to individuals having these disorders, in addition, due to the sensitivity of sexual matters, social workers need to approach patients suffering from these disorders with a lot of caution in order to get them to open up about their situations(Ryan, Ramon & Greaten 2012, p718). References Australian Association ofSocial Workers (AASW) (2008), Practice Standards for Mental Health Social Workers Australian Association of Social Workers Canberra Bailey, D. (2012). Interdisciplinary working in mental health. Houndsmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, Palgrave Macmillan. Bland, R & Renouf, N (2001), 'Social work and the mental health team', Australasian Psychiatry, vol. 9, no. 3, pp. 238-241. Bland, R, Renouf, N, Tullgren, A (2009), 'Working with families ', in Social work practice in mental health Allen & Unwin Crows Nest (Chapter 9) Burdekin, B 1(989) 'Carers: The experience of family members ', 1989, in Report of the National Inquiry into the human rights of people with mental illness., Australian Government Publishing Service, Canberra Eaton, W. W. (2012). Public mental health. New York, Oxford University Press. European Ministerial Conference on Mental Health, World Health Organization, & Who European Ministerial Conference on Mental Health. (2005). Mental health: facing the challenges, building solutions; report from the WHO European Ministerial Conference. Jacobson, N & Greenley, D (2001), 'What Is Recovery? A Conceptual Model and Explication', Psychiatric Services, vol. 52, no. 4, pp. 482-485. Martin, C. R. (2011). Perinatal Mental Health a clinical guide. Keswick, M & K Update Ltd Merighi, J, Ryan, M, Renouf, N & Healy, B (2005), 'Reassessing a theory of professional expertise: A cross-national investigation of expert mental health social workers', British Journal of Social Work, vol. 35, pp. 709-725. Noordsy, D, Torrey, W, Mead, S, Brunette, M, Potenza, D & Copeland, M (2000), 'Recovery-oriented psychopharmacology: Redefining the goals of anti-psychotic treatment’, Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, vol. 61, no. 3, pp. 22-86. Petrila, J, Sadoff, R (1992), 'Confidentiality and the family as caregiver’, Hospital and community Psychiatry, vol. 43, no. 2, pp. 136-139. Renouf, N & Bland, R (2005), 'Navigating storm waters: Challenges and opportunities for social work in mental health ', Australian Social Work, vol. 58, no. 4, pp. 419-430. Ryan, P., Ramon, S., & Greaten, T. (2012). Empowerment, lifelong learning and recovery in mental health: towards a new paradigm. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire, Palgrave Macmillan Weick, A, Rapp, C, Sullivan, WP & Kisthardt, W (1989), 'A Strengths Perspective for Social Work Practice’, Social Work, vol. 34, no. 4, p. 350. Read More