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TAG: Mental Health

Guest Post: Fewer Conferences, More Conversations

Photo: Pushing Up Daisies Festival. Skull cake: Thyme for Tiffin

 

Akiko Hart makes a plea for mental health to go outside mental health

I am, for my sins, a conference person. I organise, speak at and attend many mental health conferences every year. But this week, I went along to Pushing Up Daisies, a ‘community-grown festival’ around death and dying, in the beautiful Yorkshire market town of Todmorden. I came away reflecting that we need to rethink some of the conversations we are having around mental health.

Podcast: Race and Mental Health

Rachel Terry, Laura Lea, John McGowan and guests discuss two recent high profile publications on the subject of race in mental health

 

Though the effects of race and ethnicity on mental health have been written about and researched for many years, a wide range of inequalities persist in the mental health system. In particular, young black men are over represented in secure services and in the figures for detentions under the Mental Health Act. The last few months have seen the publication of two documents which attempt to improve this situation. One is a recent statement by the Royal College of Psychiatrists aiming to tackle the effects of racism and discrimination in the UK health system. The second is a BME (Black and Minority Ethnic) service user led document, the ‘Kindred Minds Manifesto’. To discuss these, and the multiplicity of ways in which race can influence mental health outcomes, the regular panel is joined by Raza Griffiths, the author of the Kindred Minds Manifesto, and by Trainee Psychologist Lauren Bryan. We also have interviews with sociologist Harshad Keval, Clinical Psychologist and journalist Masuma Rahim, and Psychiatrist Samei Huda*. All have considered the effects of race and discrimination and all have views on what has failed to happen thus far and what needs to happen now.

Don’t turn Britain’s schools into mental health centres

Jennie Bristow argues that government plans for ‘Mental Health First Aid’ risk pathologising ordinary childhood while doing little for those with more serious difficulties

Britain’s schools are changing: not just in terms of what is taught, but also what we expect them do to help pupils. In June 2017, the Times Educational Supplement reported that the government had put £200k behind a plan to train ‘mental health first-aiders’ in every secondary school. The funding is intended to train 3,000 teachers and teaching assistants over the next three years. ‘Teachers will receive practical advice on how to deal with mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, suicide and self-harm,’ explained the TES.

If £200k doesn’t sound like it would go a long way, in February this year, Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced a £5 million programme to train primary school staff in mental health first aid. It’s hard to argue with the proposition that providing more support for the emotional wellbeing of school children is a bad thing, but these proposals may pose problems for children with mental health difficulties and for children who are simply going through the struggles of growing up.

Guest post: The elephant in the room

Rufus May asks whether we talk enough about race in mental health.

I often think about my friend Paul. We met in Hackney hospital in the eighties when we were both psychiatric patients.  Paul was in his early thirties and Jamaican by background. His buoyant positive attitude and warmth was a great help to me during that time. A few years later when I was studying psychology, Paul contacted me again. He had been readmitted and was complaining of being over-medicated.  Although he was still in his thirties he was dying of cancer. On top of that he was back in a psychiatric ward because of his distress. However, the only treatment he was getting was a massive dose of anti-psychotic medication. No-one was giving him counselling for what he was going through. I remember clearly his words ‘They’re giving me so much medication it’s giving me nose bleeds.’ The word that didn’t get mentioned in connection with Paul was ‘racism’.

Podcast: Shit happens and it drives us crazy

Anne Cooke, Rachel Terry and John McGowan discuss whether there is a viable alternative to psychiatric diagnosis.

 

The beginning of February saw the launch of an ambitious document  aiming to offer a new way of thinking about human distress. The Power Threat Meaning Framework (published by the British Psychological Society) emphasises the role of adverse experiences in emotional suffering. The PTMF also offers an alternative to more traditional psychiatric diagnostic categories. The panel discuss the how useful the document may be, and some of the criticisms which have been made of it.