Mental health is a real issue in the United States. Studies have shown that twenty-five percent of the U.S. adult population experience a mental health disorder any given year. Oftentimes, people are greatly benefited, if not completely cured, from receiving medical attention. However, both our society and the mental health care system itself place a large amount of uncertainty in the mental health care system.
Social Response to Mental Health Care
People are frequently reluctant to receive help from professionals because society denotes mental illness as a weakness or something to be feared. Criminals and evil geniuses in countless movies are termed "mad" or "insane," thereby suggesting that such things are abominable in their very nature. Someone that acts obnoxiously at a party is termed "mental." Telling someone that you suffer from schizophrenia does not receive the same sympathy as being a cancer patient. Mental illnesses are no less real and painful. We as a society ought not to judge the twenty-five percent of our population as being anything less than valuable and important. We must sensitize the public to better understand mental illness as something to be cured, not feared.
Treatment of Mental Illness
Even among doctors trained to treat mental health, there is a large amount of mistrust of a patient's ability to recover. There is still bias as to whether a patient is capable of receiving treatment and recovering. In the Rosenhan Experiment, psychologist David Rosenhan decided to test the validity of mental health diagnoses in several mental health institutions. He had eight mentally healthy associates seek admission into twelve mental hospitals by briefly exhibiting auditory hallucinations. They were admitted, and then acted normally and insisted they felt fine. Each one was forced to admit to having a mental illness and was required to take an antipsychotic drug as a condition of release. Average time spent in the mental hospitals was nineteen days.
This proves people's mistrust of actually being cured of a mental illness. Those that truly struggle with a mental disease may be frightened of being locked up for years, despite full recovery. Mental health care should be more focused on the individual. Rosenhan showed how many patients are dehumanized upon diagnosis. Doctors should be more focused on truly curing patients, and giving them the help they need to move on with their lives. Nineteen days in a psychiatric hospital for one brief bout of hallucination sounds like doctors may feel mental illnesses are incurable. I believe that they are.
I liked how it was divided up into sections and it was different. It had pictures and videos. I didn't really quit connect to it but i really liked how it was broken up
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that you feel this blog flowed fairly easily. When you say you didn't connect, do you mean that I was unable to explain the topic sufficiently, or you don't agree with the topic generally, etc? I'd like to be able to improve my writing.
DeleteFirst, I like the layout of your post. It makes it easier to read and continue reading because of the images you have splitting it all up. I think they all flowed nicely into what was being said in the text.
ReplyDeleteI liked how you split up your text into different subtopics. This did make it easier to follow along and more direct to what you were trying to get across.
You made all you points very relate oriented. I haven't ever had a problem with any sort of mental illness, and I don't know anyone who has but you connected me to it. You gave your opinion and then backed it up with facts and statistics.
Only on the section of Treatment of Mental Illness did I not completely agree with you. I don't think doctors have a discouragement toward their patients. I think doctors have a hope for their cure. I believe they want them to get better and that they believe they will. I'm not sure if that is what you were saying, but if I just made that up ignore what I just said. I think this post was great though, good job.
Thanks Amber! I'm glad it flowed easily. And I can understand what you mean about the treatment of mental illness. I am sure most, if not all, psychologists and "mental doctors," if you will, desire for their patients to get better. But, according to the study that I was covering in the piece, we were focusing on the flaws of the system. I feel there must be a problem somewhere in the modes of diagnosis for so many patients to be wrongly accused of beings plants in the second half of the experiment. That's what I'm trying to focus on.
DeleteThanks Amber! I'm glad it flowed easily. And I can understand what you mean about the treatment of mental illness. I am sure most, if not all, psychologists and "mental doctors," if you will, desire for their patients to get better. But, according to the study that I was covering in the piece, we were focusing on the flaws of the system. I feel there must be a problem somewhere in the modes of diagnosis for so many patients to be wrongly accused of beings plants in the second half of the experiment. That's what I'm trying to focus on.
DeleteI really liked this. I thought it was interesting how you brought up how people with mental illness can't trust doctors to help them recover because a lot of people don't think about it that way. You really made the audience think to themselves about how much they really know about the topic. I like how it was broken up into different sections so the audience could get some information about each topic.I have to agree with Amber above that Doctors have a hope for the patients cure. I really liked this but make sure you are very specific about what you want the audience to learn.
ReplyDeleteKelsey Pollard
I'm glad you were able to connect with the concepts of this paper. And mostly, the part that you didn't understand and/or agree with concerns my cynicism of doctors' hopes for a cure? I will do my best to remedy these problems in the future.
DeleteThis is interesting. I had learned about Rosenhan's experiment before, so it was cool to come back and think about it more, and to hear your opinions about it. I like that not only did you bring a societal problem to light, but you also proposed a way to fix it. The video was a helpful way to get the reader to go deeper into the studies and see real situations where patients were not treated the way they should have been. However, I'm not sure that all of the issues posed are prevalent for today. I think conditions in mental hospitals today are a lot better than they were during those studies. I would recommend getting more recent studies or statistics to add to the information you already have. Also, in your second paragraph, I really liked that you related this issue to our own experiences. However, I personally feel extreme sympathy for people with schizophrenia, but I can see what you meant in that statement: although we may feel sympathy for them, we may be wary of them. Really good insight overall!
ReplyDeleteSophie Roberts
I am glad you enjoyed revisiting this experiment. i found it fascinating. And you would recommend finding some information more recent/relevant to the issues we face now? That sounds like a great idea; I will do what I can do fix that in the future. As far as the statement on schizophrenia goes, I know from personal experience that I am uncomfortable when people mention having mental problems. I myself am part of the public that I say needs to be educated.
DeleteI really enjoyed reading about the experiment in which they acted as though they needed to be admitted into a mental hospital and the doctors mistook them for legitimate patients even though they immediately began to act normal upon being admitted. I have always kind of disagreed with psychology in this regard. I believe it is impossible to truly know exactly what is going on in someone else's head. As people we are all so different and I am pretty sure everyone has thoughts that they would never want anyone else to see or hear, fearing that it would be considered crazy to think such things. When it comes down to it, everyone is pretty unpredictable, not just the people who really have certain mental conditions. So, I understand where you are coming from when you say we should have more sympathy for people who are mentally ill, they aren't really that much different than the rest of us. They just need a little help. Have you had the chance to do any research about what has improved diagnoses and treatments in mental hospitals to give them the help they need?
ReplyDeleteI am glad you find this topic interesting and relatable to your personal beliefs. I have not yet researched that, but it sounds like a great topic for my next blog. Thanks for the tip!
Delete