Human Rights and Global Mental Health: Reducing the Use of Coercive Measures

2021 ◽  
pp. 247-268
Author(s):  
Kelso R. Cratsley ◽  
Marisha N. Wickremsinhe ◽  
Tim K. Mackey
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Coercive Measures

scholarly journals Global mental health should engage with the ethics of involuntary admission

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marisha N. Wickremsinhe
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Clinical Ethics ◽  
Psychiatric Care ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Mental Healthcare ◽  
Involuntary Admission ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
Psychosocial Disability

AbstractGlobal mental health, as a field, has focused on both increasing access to mental health services and promoting human rights. Amidst many successes in engaging with and addressing various human rights violations affecting individuals living with psychosocial disabilities, one human rights challenge remains under-discussed: involuntary inpatient admission for psychiatric care. Global mental health ought to engage proactively with the debate on the ethics of involuntary admission and work to develop a clear position, for three reasons. Firstly, the field promotes models of mental healthcare that are likely to include involuntary admission. Secondly, the field aligns much of its human rights framework with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which opposes the discriminatory use of involuntary admission on the basis of psychosocial disability or impairment. Finally, global mental health, as a field, is uniquely positioned to offer novel contributions to this long-standing debate in clinical ethics by collecting data and conducting analyses across settings. Global mental health should take up involuntary admission as a priority area of engagement, applying its own orientation toward research and advocacy in order to explore the dimensions of when, if ever, involuntary admission may be permissible. Such work stands to offer meaningful contributions to the challenge of involuntary admission.

scholarly journals Challenges and opportunities in global mental health: a perspective from WHO

2016 ◽  
Vol 25 (6) ◽  
pp. 495-498 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Saxena
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Psychological Interventions ◽  
Exchange Of Information ◽  
Challenges And Opportunities ◽  
Global Exchange

This paper enumerates and briefly discusses WHO’s recent contributions to global mental health and the current challenges and opportunities in this area. It briefly discusses response to diversity across countries and communities, the need for innovations and global exchange of information, evidence and knowledge and raises issues like psychological interventions and human rights related to mental health.

Human rights in community psychiatry

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Genevra Richardson
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Community Mental Health ◽  
Mental Health Professionals ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Mental Health Policy ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Health It ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
United Nations Convention

This chapter examines the increased concern for human rights within the global mental health policy agenda and considers what value human rights might add in relation to the use of coercion in community mental health. It describes the position underlying the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and compares it with the more radical approach of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). While the CRPD might be more challenging to mental health professionals, it contains within its principles that the wishes and preferences of the person be centre stage and as such deserve to be taken seriously in the provision of community mental health care.

scholarly journals Nurses’ perspectives on human rights when coercion is used in psychiatry: a systematic review protocol of qualitative evidence

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Pierre Pariseau-Legault ◽  
Sandrine Vallée-Ouimet ◽  
Marie-Hélène Goulet ◽  
Jean-Daniel Jacob
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Systematic Review ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Mental Health Problems ◽  
World Health ◽  
Involuntary Hospitalization ◽  
Qualitative Synthesis ◽  
Coercive Measures ◽  
Manual Search ◽  
Qualitative Evidence

Abstract Background The World Health Organization describes the perpetuation of human rights violations against people with mental health problems as a global emergency. Despite this observation, recent studies suggest that coercive measures, such as seclusion, restraints, involuntary hospitalization, or involuntary treatment, are steadily or increasingly being used without proof of their effectiveness. In nursing, several literature reviews have focused on understanding nurses’ perspectives on the use of seclusion and restraints. Although many studies describe the ethical dilemmas faced by nurses in this context, to this date, their perspectives on patient’s rights when a broad variety of coercive measures are used are not well understood. The aim of this review is to produce a qualitative synthesis of how human rights are actually integrated into psychiatric and mental health nursing practice in the context of coercive work. Methods Noblit and Hare’s meta-ethnographic approach will be used to conduct this systematic review. The search will be conducted in CINAHL, Medline, PsycINFO, ERIC, and Scopus databases, using the PICo model (Population, phenomenon of Interest, Context) and a combination of keywords and descriptors. It will be complemented by a manual search of non-indexed articles, gray literature, and other applicable data sources, such as human rights related documents. Qualitative and mixed-method study designs will be included in this review. Empirical and peer-reviewed articles published between 2008 and 2019 will be selected. Articles will be evaluated independently by two reviewers to determine their inclusion against eligibility criteria. The quality of the selected papers will then be independently evaluated by two reviewers, using the Joanna Briggs Institute’s Checklist for Qualitative Research. Data extraction and content analysis will focus on first- and second-order constructs, that is, the extraction of research participants’ narratives and their interpretation. Discussion This review will provide a synthesis of how psychiatric and mental health nurses integrate human rights principles into their practice, as well as it will identify research gaps in this area. The results of this review will then provide qualitative evidence to better understand how nurses can contribute to the recognition, protection, and advocate for human rights in a psychiatric context. Systematic review registration PROSPERO, CRD42019116862

scholarly journals The Deinstitutionalization of Lithuanian Mental Health Services in Light of the Evidence-based Practice and Principles of Global Mental Health

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (15) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Ugnė Grigaitė
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Mental Health Services ◽  
Health Services ◽  
Health Outcomes ◽  
Mental Health Problems ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Mental Health Outcomes ◽  
Major Step ◽  
Current Form

During this time, in which Lithuania is going through the deinstitutionalization of its mental health services, the principles of Global Mental Health are especially relevant. This global field for study, research and practice places a priority on improving mental health outcomes as well as reducing respective inequities for all people worldwide. Scaling-up support services for persons who have mental health problems based on both scientific evidence and human rights has become one of the main focuses for action globally, and the key principles of Global Mental Health apply to the situation in Lithuania as much as they do in a number of other countries. This article explores the critical need to effectively reform the existing mental health care system in the country, which in its current form often results in human rights violations. It points to the idea, based on the global evidence base, that different Lithuanian authorities and other key stakeholders could start working together in an intersectoral way in order to reorganize mental health services from institutional to community-based models of care. It is suggested by this article that a sensible, local application of the broad key principles of Global Mental Health could be a mature and rational step taken by Lithuania. This has the potential to be a major step toward the improvement of human rights and mental health outcomes in the country.

scholarly journals Global mental health and psychiatric institutions in the 21st century

2016 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-9 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Cohen ◽  
H. Minas
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
English Language ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights Abuses ◽  
The Past ◽  
Psychiatric Institutions ◽  
Area Of Concern ◽  
The 19Th Century

In the 19th century, psychiatric institutions were the focus of thousands of articles in the leading English-language medical and psychiatric journals. This area of concern remained important through the first half of the 20th century, with some decline in the number of published articles in the second half of the 20th century as de-institutionalisation gathered pace. The number of articles about this topic has declined sharply in the past 25 years, and psychiatric institutions are not the focus of any of the Grand Challenges in Global Mental Health even though psychiatric institutions of all kinds are widely acknowledged to be the among the main sites of human rights abuses. In this commentary we present examples of impressive transformations of institutions in Sri Lanka and Vietnam, and suggest that the field of global mental health should devote more of its efforts to improving the lives of persons with mental disorders who have been incarcerated in a variety of settings, often under the care of mental health specialists.

scholarly journals Refugee mental health and human rights: A challenge for global mental health

2021 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 147-156
Author(s):  
Rachel Kronick ◽  
G. Eric Jarvis ◽  
Laurence J. Kirmayer
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Lived Experience ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Mental Health Policy ◽  
Forced Migration ◽  
Epidemiological Studies ◽  
Mental Health Research ◽  
Transcultural Psychiatry ◽  
Policy And Practice

This article introduces a thematic issue of Transcultural Psychiatry that presents recent work that deepens our understanding of the refugee experience—from the forces of displacement, through the trajectory of migration, to the challenges of resettlement. Mental health research on refugees and asylum seekers has burgeoned over the past two decades with epidemiological studies, accounts of the lived experience, new conceptual frameworks, and advances in understanding of effective treatment and intervention. However, there are substantial gaps in available research, and important ethical and methodological challenges. These include: the need to adopt decolonizing, participatory methods that amplify refugee voices; the further development of frameworks for studying the broad impacts of forced migration that go beyond posttraumatic stress disorder; and more translational research informed by longitudinal studies of the course of refugee adaptation. Keeping a human rights advocacy perspective front and center will allow researchers to work in collaborative ways with both refugee communities and receiving societies to develop innovative mental health policy and practice to meet the urgent need for a global response to the challenge of forced migration, which is likely to grow dramatically in the coming years as a result of the impacts of climate change.

scholarly journals Four reflections on the new global mental health priorities

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Miguel Caldas-de-Almeida
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Global Mental Health ◽  
Treatment Quality ◽  
Health Priorities ◽  
Effective Response ◽  
Middle Income ◽  
Human Rights Protection ◽  
Vision For Action ◽  
The Impact

Abstract The discussion of the achievements and limitations of the strategies prioritised in global mental health that has taken place in recent years contributed to a unified vision for action that addresses the gaps still existing on prevention, treatment, quality of care and human rights protection. This editorial presents four reflections on the impact of this vision on the definition of future priorities, particularly in the areas of policy implementation, services reconfiguration and organisation, human rights and research. It concludes that further debate is needed to redefine the balance between priorities and strategies that can better promote an effective response to the needs of low and middle income countries, and to ensure an efficient coordination of efforts in the future.

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