Chapter 6: Social Work in Mental Health

A Sample of Major

Psychotropic

Medications

Mental Health Bill Of Rights:

A Courageous Researcher and Reformer Dorothea Dix

Antianxiety: Anxiety disorders (including panic disorders, phobias,

obsessive-compulsive disorder

posttraumatic stress disorder.

Psychostimulant: Attention deficit

hyperactivity disorder.

• Dorothea was a famous reformer whose work in the US brought attention to the inhumane treatment of the mentally ill in the US

Social Work Competencies For

Mental Health Practice

Gradual Enlightenment:

Social Work Competencies For

Mental Health Practice

To prepare for a career in mental health

(need to have a field placement in a mental health settings)

It presents opportunities to work with people

who are experiencing mental or emotional problems.

• She volunteered for a jail near Boston where she discovered that there was a need for a mentally ill hospital due to the fact that the mentally ill were being placed in jail without treatment

Schizophrenia

In mental health settings, social workers find that as a professional group, they have certain advantages. Their professional education prepares social workers with competence in practice behaviors and roles such as:

* Advocacy

* Accessing referral resources

* Brief treatment,

* Crisis intervention

• This bill addressed consumers' rights to information about their health plans , their rights to information about the professionals who deliver services ,the right to have emergency services and the right to appeal decisions of the health care plan
• This bill of rights was addressed by President Bill Clinton
• This initiative put an end to stigmatization and discrimination for people who suffer from major or minor mental disorders

GENERALIST PRACTICE WITH GROUPS AND COMMUNITIES

• As a result of her hard work and dedication the legislator decided to open up a hospital to treat the mentally ill in Massachusetts

• The first State hospital for the mentally ill in the US was opened in Williamsburg Virginia in 1773
• Before this the mentally ill were cared for in poor houses that also cared for people with tuberculosis, syphilis, and other contagious diseases
• The mentally ill did not have their own specialized centers therefor they had to be treated with the same care the sick people with contagious diseases were cared for

Working with Groups in Mental Health

In social work, groups practices are used with all ages for providing:

• Therapy
• Counseling
• Teaching Skill Development
• Raising Self-esteem
• Problem Solving

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Children that suffer emotional problems due to a death of a parent or someone significant to them are referred to a mental health clinic.

• As an ongoing result , her progression became world wide making countries open up hospitals to treat the mentally ill

GENERALIST PRACTICE IN CASE MANAGEMENT

Community Practice

Social Justice Issues in the Mental Health Field

When the symptoms (panic,anger,or hostility) last beyond a month, however, or depression or intense anxiety persists, the person should be evaluated for possible PTSD.

Case management focuses more on work with individual people and less on community change.

One form of of intervention in mental health practice.

Social workers meet with their clients out in the community:where they live, work, or go to school.

Case management often involves long-term work with people who have multiple or complex problems.

Monitoring is done regularly to ensure clients needs are being meet.

Case management relationship may be terminated because client no longer needs this service, the social worker leaves the agency and a new case management is assigned, or because the client chooses to end it.

Social Justice concerns abound in the field of mental health. The diagnostic labels decribed earlier may cause damage.

Social workers also seek to assist communities, at-risk populations, or organizations to promote mental health or design programs for people with mental health problems.

Practice With Diverse Populations

Cultural competence in social work involves knowledge of history and patterns of oppression experienced by cultural and ethnic groups and the traditions and values of those groups.

Mental Work Policy and social work practice:

Social Workers today help people heal from traumatic experiences and provide services to diverse populations with mental needs but there is a policy that limits the service and access to patient care

Acute Traumatic Stress

Social Workers respond to disaster: Acute and Postraumatic Stress

Environmental Perspectives on Mental Health

By:

Lupita Perez, Erwin Hurtado, Cinthya Camacho, Monse Arriaga and Glenda Esquivel

During and immediately following disasters, people may be subjected to overwhelming physical and phsychological distress..

Neotraditional Families

Some of the members use the English language and have adopted new rituals and spiritual healers; most family members retain traditional beliefs.

It is not difficult to imagine how their unsafe and hazardous environments put mentally ill people living on the streets at risk of physical health problems, rape, and criminal victimization.

A Sample of Major Psychotropic

Medications

(Activity)

Antipsychotic: Schizophrenia, bipolar

disorders, major depressions,

organic mental disorders.

Antidepressant: Major depressions, dysthymia

(persistent minor depression)

adjustment disorders.

Mood stabilizer: Bipolar disorder

Classification and Treatment of Mental Disorders

Social Workers in mental health

settings clearly need an understanding of mental illness.

They need to be able to use the terminology of the current psychiatric mental illness classification system.

Team Relationships

Specific Knowledge Base

for Mental Health

* Psychiatrist

* Psychologist

* Psychiatric nurse

* One or more Social Workers

Whether disasters are caused by terrorist attack; shootings at school; or natural events such as hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, floods, or forest fires, social workers respond.

Traditional and Bicultural Families

Families use English in the community but speak the native language at home. They use contemporary American health care.

Acculturated

* Require an additional layer of knowledge and skills.

*Learn how to work effectively.

Families have lost their native language, religion, and often even their extended kinship system; they rely on contemporary American health care.

Panrenaissance

Families seek to renew their native language fluency and to revitalize some aspects of the traditional religion.

Social Worker John Red Horse provides guidelines that aid our understanding of the intensity and the differences. In 1988 classified Native Americans families along as spectrum from traditional to pan renaissance.

What does it mean to be schizophrenic?

Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that generally appears in late adolescence or early adulthood, however, it can emerge at any time in life. It is one of many brain diseases that may include delusions, loss of personality, confusion, agitation, social withdrawal, psychosis, and bizarre behavior.

Chapter 6: Social Work in Mental Health