Mental Health Care Deinstitutionalization Paper

During the 1700’s the jails were not only used to confine criminals, but they confined people with mental illness as well. People with mental illness were subjected to inhumane treatment, even when the individual was admitted

Anyone with a mental illness knows that recovery is not a straight line. Thoughts don’t regain their rationality the second someone decides to become medication compliant, when an anorexic takes a bite of food, or even the day a depressed person decides to walk outside and see beyond their dreary perception of reality. I always wanted to get better, to be able to eat a slice of pizza without demolishing the box and punishing my throat, or to be able to not worry that the carnal impulses of mania would throw me out of the driver’s seat. However, I didn’t want to take the steps to seek help in time, then in the second semester of my sophomore year, I gave up. This led to me

As Americans it becomes natural to undermine those with a mental illness. As a fact, many adults and children deal with mental illness each and everyday. There are many stories that have been told to Americans about depression, anxiety, along with bipolar disorders, with the outcome usually being a negative consequence. For the 1 in every 5 citizens that deal with a mental illness each year. Americans have neglected the fact that many adults and children deal with mental issue(s), the citizens that refrain from getting help; their well being can suffer detrimental effects, there is not a lot of awareness either taught in school, or in public perspectives, American’s stigma has perfected their

Mental Health America (formerly known as the National Mental Health Association) is the country’s leading nonprofit dedicated to helping all people live mentally healthier lives. With more than 320 affiliate nationwide, we represent a growing movement of Americans who promote mental wellness for the health and well being of the nation, every day, and in a time of crisis (2007 Mental Health America). As an organization, Mental Health America has been around for nearly a century. We began work in 1909 when Clifford W. Beers, a young business man who struggled with a mental illness and shared his story with the world in his autobiography “A Mind

During the 1800s, treating individuals with psychological issues was a problematic and disturbing issue. Society didn’t understand mental illness very well, so the mentally ill individuals were sent to asylums primarily to get them off the streets. Patients in asylums were usually subjected to conditions that today we would consider horrific and inhumane due to the lack of knowledge on mental illnesses.

It not easy to determine how many people suffer from mental illness. This is due to the changing definitions of mental illness and problems classifying, diagnosing, and reporting mental disorders. There are social stigmas attached to mental illness, such as being labeled "crazy," being treated as a danger to others, and being denied jobs or health insurance coverage. These negative connotations keep many sufferers from seeking help, and many of those in treatment do not reveal it on surveys. Some patients do not realize that their symptoms are caused by mental disorders. Even though more is being learned about how the brain works a lot of information has still yet to be discovered, thus mental health professionals must continually reevaluate how mental illnesses are defined and diagnosed. The Surgeon General 's report estimated that roughly 20% of the United States population was affected by mental disorders and that 15% use some type of mental health service every year. Community surveys estimate about 30% of the adult population in the United States suffer from mental disorders.

Mental health services in St. Louis have undergone a multitude of changes as stigmas towards mental health issues have begun to change. Traditionally, mentally ill individuals were thought to be lacking religion or in trouble in the eyes of God, and this thought process was believed until after the Middle Ages. These beliefs may have changed, but the attitudes towards the mentally ill were continued into the 18th century and beyond, which caused an increase in the stigmatization of mental illness, and thus subjected these individuals to humiliating and unhealthy conditions found in the original confinement of mentally ill patients, asylums. The government created mental health asylums, which separated these individuals from their societies,

The United States has never had an official federal-centered approach for mental health care facilities, entrusting its responsibility to the states throughout the history. The earliest initiatives in this field took place in the 18th century, when Virginia built its first asylum and Pennsylvania Hospital reserved its basement to house individuals with mental disorders (Sundararaman, 2009). During the 19th century, other services were built, but their overall lack of quality was alarming. Even then, researchers and professionals in the mental health field attempted to implement the principles of the so-called public health, focusing on prevention and early intervention, but the funds were in the hands of the local governments, which prevented significant advances in this direction.

Although the 19th century expansion of asylums in Europe and The United States was a movement initially based on moral principles, it led to significant negative implications for individuals, who were institutionalized as asylums became overcrowded, lacking hygiene, neglectful of patients and an overall place for poor living conditions (Wright, 1997). The rise in in-patient population in the early 19th century and patients’ inabilities to reintegrate into the community as a result of institutionalization have often been explained in terms of the mental health system and developments in psychology at the time. Sociologists on the other hand, have argued that these institutions have caused people to remain institutionalized. A compelling

There are many people in the United States that have a mental illness that is either not

What comes to mind when you hear the words “insane asylum”? Do such terms as lunatic, crazy, scary, or even haunted come to mind? More than likely these are the terminology that most of us would use to describe our perception of insane asylums. However, those in history that had a heart’s desire to treat the mentally ill compassionately and humanely had a different viewpoint. Insane asylums were known for their horrendous treatment of the mentally ill, but the ultimate purpose in the reformation of insane asylums in the nineteenth century was to improve the treatment for the mentally ill by providing a humane and caring environment for them to reside.

Insane asylums are hospitals that specialize in the treatment of serious mental disorders, such as clinical depression and schizophrenia. The treatment of mental illnesses dates to 5000 B.C.E, where illnesses were treated by trephining to release evil spirits. The treatment for the mentally ill was different depending on the culture and period. The first public mental asylum was established in the early 19th century in Britain after the passing of the 1808 County Asylums Act. The County Asylums Act was passed in the UK Parliament to establish places to care for people with mental health problems. Due to this act, each county in the UK was required to create asylums to house people judged to be mentally insane. Unfortunately, due to the social

The invention of the asylum was the reformation that made changes in regards to how demented patients were handled. Before reforms were made, mentally ill patients were uncared for and abused.The insane were never hospitalized and only imprisoned. The mentally ill were locked up, flogged, chained, sexually and physically abused by imprisoners. These institutions were inspired by the conviction that those who passed through their doors could eventually be released to become productive, self-disciplined citizens. An asylum is not a symbol of freedom, but to reformers it was. freedom was all about not having the choice to sin so you could be free of sin, so the crusading reformers that built these places usually chose not to live in

Asylums were established around the world starting from the sixteenth century onward. Most asylums were staffed by untrained people who treated mentally ill patients like animals. “Asylums were merely reformed penal institutions where the mentally ill were abandoned by relatives or sentenced by the law and faced a life of human treatments, all for the sake of lifting the burden off the ashamed families and preventing any possible disturbance in the

The way people with severe mental illness were treated in institutions starting in the mid-eighteenth with the belief of at least improved their situations. Institution settings became posable because of the growth of cities. The rationale was to provide early intervention and the acknowledgement of the outside effects of their psychosis. However, the system resulted in a class-based system, was the affluent was able high-quality care and was not forced to not mix with members of the lower class, who would receive basically custodial care. The expansion of asylums continued until its peak in 1955. At about this time the growth of institutions ruined the very thing that encouraged it: the ability to cure insanity.