scholarly journals Mental Illness and Mental Health: Is the Glass Half Empty or Half Full?

2012 ◽  
Vol 57 (11) ◽  
pp. 651-658 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph M Pierre

During the past century, the scope of mental health intervention in North America has gradually expanded from an initial focus on hospitalized patients with psychoses to outpatients with neurotic disorders, including the so-called worried well. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), Fifth Edition, is further embracing the concept of a mental illness spectrum, such that increasing attention to the softer end of the continuum can be expected in the future. This anticipated shift rekindles important questions about how mental illness is defined, how to distinguish between mental disorders and normal reactions, whether psychiatry is guilty of prevalence inflation, and when somatic therapies should be used to treat problems of living. Such debates are aptly illustrated by the example of complicated bereavement, which is best characterized as a form of adjustment disorder. Achieving an overarching definition of mental illness is challenging, owing to the many different contexts in which DSM diagnoses are used. Careful analyses of such contextual utility must inform future decisions about what ends up in DSM, as well as how mental illness is defined by public health policy and society at large. A viable vision for the future of psychiatry should include a spectrum model of mental health (as opposed to exclusively mental illness) that incorporates graded, evidence-based interventions delivered by a range of providers at each point along its continuum.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Novrial Ahmad Hanif

Mental health is projected to be one of issues that would be a problem among people's live in the future. This issue is caused by a lack of knowledge and insight into the mental health community, as well as the negative stigma attached to people's perceptions of mental illness and the sufferers. The negative stigma hamper government and community efforts in creating mental health in the community. Stigma obstruct the recovery process of mental disorders that can happen to any human being and for the sufferers will be difficult to live in the midst of the general public.


10.17816/cp63 ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-7
Author(s):  
Norman Sartorius

Since the Second World War mental health programmes and psychiatry have made significant advances. Countries, as well as the United Nations, have recognized the magnitude and severity of mental health problems, and numerous national programmes have been launched to deal with them. Technology relating to the treatment of mental disorders has advanced and significant progress has been made in terms of knowledge regarding the functioning of the brain. The awareness of the need to protect the human rights of those with mental illness has increased. National and regional programmes against stigma and the consequent discrimination of those with mental illness, have been launched in many countries. Associations bringing together those who have experienced mental illness and their relatives, have come into existence in many countries. While these are great steps forward, more work is necessary to complete these advances. In low- and middle-income countries, the vast majority of people with mental disorders do not receive adequate treatment. Even in highly industrialized countries, a third of people with severe forms of mental illness are not receiving the appropriate therapy. Laws concerning mental health are outdated in many countries. The protection of the human rights of the mentally ill is incomplete and imperfect. The emphasis on economic gain and the digitalization of medicine in recent years has not helped. On occasions, this has even slowed down the development of mental health services, and the provision of mental healthcare. Thus, psychiatry must still deal with the challenges of the past century, while facing new demands and tasks. Among the new tasks for psychiatry are undoubtedly reforms which will allow (i) the provision of appropriate care of people with comorbid mental and physical disorders, (ii) the application of interventions leading to the primary prevention of mental and neurological disorders, and (iii) a radical reform of the education of psychiatrists and other mental health workers, dealing with mental illness. Collaboration with other stakeholders in the field of mental health and medicine, will be of crucial importance in relation to all these tasks.


2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (01) ◽  
pp. 35-42
Author(s):  
M. Hermans

SummaryThe author presents his personal opinion inviting to discussion on the possible future role of psychiatrists. His view is based upon the many contacts with psychiatrists all over Europe, academicians and everyday professionals, as well as the familiarity with the literature. The list of papers referred to is based upon (1) the general interest concerning the subject when representing ideas also worded elsewhere, (2) the accessibility to psychiatrists and mental health professionals in Germany, (3) being costless downloadable for non-subscribers and (4) for some geographic aspects (e.g. Belgium, Spain, Sweden) and the latest scientific issues, addressing some authors directly.


2007 ◽  
Vol 191 (2) ◽  
pp. 158-163 ◽  
Author(s):  
David L. Fone ◽  
Frank Dunstan ◽  
Ann John ◽  
Keith Lloyd

BackgroundThe relationship between the Mental Illness Needs Index (MINI) and the common mental disorders is not known.AimsTo investigate associations between the small-area MINI score and common mental disorder at individual level.MethodMental health status was measured using the Mental Health Inventory of the Short Form 36 instrument (SF-36). Data from the Caerphilly Health and Social Needs population survey were analysed in multilevel models of 10 653 individuals aged 18–74 years nested within the 2001 UK census geographies of 110 lower super output areas and 33 wards.ResultsThe MINI score was significantly associated with common mental disorder after adjusting for individual risk factors. This association was stronger at the smaller spatial scale of the lower super output area and for individuals who were permanently sick or disabled.ConclusionsThe MINI is potentially useful for small-area needs assessment and service planning for common mental disorder in community settings.


Author(s):  
Daniel Román-Sánchez ◽  
Juan Carlos Paramio-Cuevas ◽  
Olga Paloma-Castro ◽  
José Luis Palazón-Fernández ◽  
Isabel Lepiani-Díaz ◽  
...  

Mental health nurses, together with psychiatrists, are the healthcare professionals who display the highest levels of empathy and the best attitudes towards patients with mental disorders. However, burnout is a common problem among these professionals. The aim of our study is to describe the association between empathy, burnout, and attitudes towards patients with mental disorders among mental health nurses in Spain. A descriptive cross-sectional design was used involving a sample of 750 specialist nurses working in mental health facilities in Spain. An intentional, non-probability, non-discriminative, exponential snowball sampling method was used. The Jefferson Scale of Empathy, the Maslach Burnout Inventory, and the Community Attitudes towards Mental Illness Inventory were used to measure the study variables. A positive correlation was observed between empathy and all the study variables, with the exception of the personal accomplishment dimension of burnout and the social restrictiveness and authoritarianism dimensions of attitudes towards mental illness, where a negative relation was observed. Our findings suggest that empathy is associated with an increase in positive attitudes towards patients with mental disorders, decreasing associated stigma, but did not act as a protective factor against burnout in the study sample.


Healthcare ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 1422
Author(s):  
Evaldas Kazlauskas ◽  
Odeta Gelezelyte ◽  
Auguste Nomeikaite ◽  
Paulina Zelviene

Multiple empirical studies have revealed significant pandemic effects of COVID-19 on mental health in various populations. This study aimed to analyze the incidences of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and adjustment disorder (AjD) in national healthcare in 2018–2020 in one of the European countries—Lithuania—and estimate the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on PTSD and AjD incidences in 2020. The national healthcare registry was used for estimations of diagnosis of PTSD, AjD, and major depressive disorder (MD). The study revealed that stress-related disorders PTSD and AjD are diagnosed rarely, resulting in a considerable gap between the expected prevalence and incidences of these diagnoses in healthcare in Lithuania. Moreover, a significant decline in mental disorders incidence in healthcare in 2020, in comparison to 2018 and 2019, was found, revealing that the COVID-19 pandemic had a negative impact on access to healthcare services and increased barriers for mental disorders treatment. The study indicates that major developments in building up knowledge about the effects of trauma and life stressors on mental health are needed in Lithuania and other countries to increase awareness about stress-related disorders and improve care for trauma survivors, in particular in the context of the pandemics or other large-scale disasters.


2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Athi Linda Yani ◽  
Mohamad Ali Murtadho

Bongkot village has many people suffering from mental disorders. There are around fifty people suffering from mental disorders. Prediction of mental disorders at table three is usually done through interviews. Cadres need to fill out the form provided on the Towards Healthy Soul Card (KMSJ) at the interview. The form needs to be filled out based on the results of the interview to predict whether the interviewee has a mental illness or not. If the results of the interview are predicted to have a mental disorder, the cadre will recommend appropriate follow-up. This process is certainly prone to mistakes because it only depends on cadre knowledge. Predictions will certainly affect the recommendations given. in this community service program, the authors propose to apply Information Technology (IT) to reduce the risk of such errors. The system is named the Mental Health Posyandu Management Information System (SIM). The system is expected to be able to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of services at the posyandu, the output of this service produces an online-based application related to the service of mental health posyandu with the address www. poskeswa.com.


Author(s):  
Rebecca McKnight ◽  
Jonathan Price ◽  
John Geddes

One in four individuals suffer from a psychiatric disorder at some point in their life, with 15– 20 per cent fitting cri­teria for a mental disorder at any given time. The latter corresponds to around 450 million people worldwide, placing mental disorders as one of the leading causes of global morbidity. Mental health problems represent five of the ten leading causes of disability worldwide. The World Health Organization (WHO) reported in mid 2016 that ‘the global cost of mental illness is £651 billion per year’, stating that the equivalent of 50 million working years was being lost annually due to mental disorders. The financial global impact is clearly vast, but on a smaller scale, the social and psychological impacts of having a mental dis­order on yourself or your family are greater still. It is often difficult for the general public and clin­icians outside psychiatry to think of mental health dis­orders as ‘diseases’ because it is harder to pinpoint a specific pathological cause for them. When confronted with this view, it is helpful to consider that most of medicine was actually founded on this basis. For ex­ample, although medicine has been a profession for the past 2500 years, it was only in the late 1980s that Helicobacter pylori was linked to gastric/ duodenal ul­cers and gastric carcinoma, or more recently still that the BRCA genes were found to be a cause of breast cancer. Still much of clinical medicine treats a patient’s symptoms rather than objective abnormalities. The WHO has given the following definition of mental health:… Mental health is defined as a state of well- being in which every individual realizes his or her own po­tential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community.… This is a helpful definition, because it clearly defines a mental disorder as a condition that disrupts this state in any way, and sets clear goals of treatment for the clinician. It identifies the fact that a disruption of an individual’s mental health impacts negatively not only upon their enjoyment and ability to cope with life, but also upon that of the wider community.


Curationis ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
J.J. Keogh

A definition of community nursing was given, and the following roles of the community nurse was briefly described: - A provider for primary health care. - A provider of personal health care to non-hospital patients. - A n advisor. - A n observer. The special skills that a community nurse must have was also briefly discussed. The role of the community nurse in the handling and prevention of mental illness at the three levels of prevention was discussed, and criteria for the measurement of mental health was highlighted.


CNS Spectrums ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (5) ◽  
pp. 638-650 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel A. Dvoskin ◽  
James L. Knoll ◽  
Mollie Silva

This article traces the history of the way in which mental disorders were viewed and treated, from before the birth of Christ to the present day. Special attention is paid to the process of deinstitutionalization in the United States and the failure to create an adequately robust community mental health system to care for the people who, in a previous era, might have experienced lifelong hospitalization. As a result, far too many people with serious mental illnesses are living in jails and prisons that are ill-suited and unprepared to meet their needs.


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