Dr Morgan

Thank you for a timely, excellent and accurate article. Very much appreciated. I bet Tony Abbott doesn't read it!

I have been working in the psychiatric/mental health nursing field since 1978. I concur with all of your assertions.

Tony Abbott is a disgrace. I guess he thinks that his famiily and friends are excempt from mental illness? But then, when you think about it - all politicians at both Federal and State levels are a disgrace - given that none of them have done a thing to advocate for people with mental health problems. I suppose they also share a delusional system which protects their female fold from rape and the mental health/illness legacies that rape inevitably gives. Oh yeah, that's right. They all have private health cover. They can hide away in luxurious private mental health institutions (I have worked in them) with their bogus diagnoses. They don't have to set foot in the public sector.

I sincerely hope that when John Brogden becomes well, that he speaks out and becomes an advocate for mental health services.

Things are bound to get worse. "Real" psychiatric/mental nurses are a retiring and dying race. Who is going to replace us? We are all in our late 40s and above now. Bring back hospital based specialist psych/mental health nursing courses! I have taught in the tertiary sector. The lack of mental health/illness input is a disgrace.

Thank God for SANE and Beyond Blue. Thank God for you and Jeff Kennet.

Thank you again
Cheers
Kay

Thanks Paul for bring me up to speed with this issue. I've know for years how our so called mental health system was failing often the most vulnerable in our society. In Indigenous communities mental health system is virtually non-existent (at least one that is readily identifiable and funded according to need).
When contact is made its usually in reaction mode to the situation and issues - moreover, issues relatng to the cultural competency of these services often impedes good prognosis and help.

As with other areas of health and community care we once again find ourselves captured inbetween the State and Federal governments fighting over dollars and responsibility.

This is an urgent matter that requires urgent bi-partisan support and heaps of funding.

Well to be honest Tony Abbot who is a total pain has a job to do
Now its the tax payers money> Right.
Ok well i would like to put another spin on it.People expect someone else to look after their kids and the druggies who get mental heath problems to be cared for. What about a card to be law for people with mental health problems to protect the public from upsetting us. I rent rooms and i have been asaulted twice. They were not charged because they had mental problems. What a cop out. Lay off the pot or dont ask us to care. What about our mental health and safety . 91 percent of mental health cases are because og drugs. The other 7 percent should get help.
Kerry Davis

Wendy

I have been nursing in the mental health field since 1978. Your assertion is beyond belief.

Rainier

There are few professionals who have an understanding of indigenous mental health problems. I have worked with indigenous people and I have written programs - albeit naive - but I tried my best.

Kay

I would like to bring two points to this forum.
The Health Minister needs to re-institute an effective national forum within his department for mental health services in Australia. This encompassess both the mental health of the wider community and the equally important issue of people experiencing mental ill health.

Funding and approaches for these two inter-related issues are often confused and this results in lack of direction for two important efforts
1. the destigmatisation of mental illness
2. the prevention and early intervention efforts to ensure better mental health for Australians

I would NOT agree with the SANE statement ( although I am a great supporter of this organisation) to close all mental institutions and replace them with community support. The concept of asylum is often ignored. We need to provide this oasis of retreat for some people who need it...but with gentler protocols in place. Community living often provides a 'place' to live but little 'community' to spend the day with. Some older persons who have lived with mental illness for decades have not ( unfortunately) been able to benefit from the new treatments available. We need to be mindful of their needs and provide support that allows them comfort, place and acceptance. Many display unfortunate side efefcts of earlier medications such as Tardive Diskinesia that makes them a figure of ridicule in the wider community. YES people should be able to go out into community but some also need a place of refuge where they are surrounded by acceptance as well.

As someone who has worked in this area for over 3 decades I have seen so many positive chages ( still a long way to go) however we need to provide for all ages and all personal choices. This is true advocacy.
Thank you
CassinTaz

Cassin Taz

Great post mate! In last week's mental health threads I said a very similar thing.

Yes - asylum means a place of safety.

Cheers
Kay

Yes there is much wrong with the mental health system. This has always been the case.

Mental health is portrayed as being the responsibility of Health. This I beleive is very wrong. The issues surrounding mental health goes beyond health and into many other areas.

Health is seen as being the sole provider for the mentally ill.

The presence of so many mentally ill on the streets and in prisons is not only caused by lack of medical services.

In fact it is impossible for any health services to be of value while the mentally ill have no housing or employment to benefit from medical treatment.

The families of these people also suffer from lack of servies, especially the children.

So Mr Abbott, you can throw your hands up in horror and say that state mental health servies are to blame. Does he realise that mental health services could be of more benefit and give service to more if they where only responsible for medical treatment.

If they responsibilty for housing, education, training,employment,
legal aid and family support for the mentally ill were met by the revalent departments, both Federally and State, better outcomes maybe achieved.

If Mr Abbott really understood or cared. he is in a wonderful position to lead and bring change to people when they need that extra support to survive.

Australia's National Mental Health Service is in urgent need of structural reforms, especially in funding areas for community enterprising services.

Ministers and leaders at all levels have failed to acknowledge that the crisis in mental health servicing is the result of poor recognition of progressive "economic health policy" in planning for social sustainable development.

It appears there is a broad number of sociological problems in human development, where the sociological expedience for mental health, is systematically under-developed.

This has led to an increase in 'quasi" diagnosing, an escalation in de facto psychiatric institutions, where a diversity of "structural" problems plague Australia's mental health services, revealing that stigma against people affected by mental illness, where discrimination, is also systemic.

It is appalling in such a self-proclaimed successful country as Australia, to find; "The needs of people affected by mental illness are disregarded at the highest political levels where policies are set and funding decisions are made within health bureaucracies. These bureaucracies regularly give such people the lowest priority."

Rehabilitation and support programs are urgently required to help prevent "mental illness" by attending to the social disruptions that only add to an increase in "mental illness" process of making new assessments. This is because these assessment relieve politicians of "the social burden" by displacing the actual 'blame for the consequences of poor service delivery, onto the mentally ill themselves'.

In Australia, we urgently need "legislative change at federal and state levels to outlaw vilification and harassment" of people with a psychological, psychiatric, and enforced disabilities, which add to the disruptions caused by the strain of related social problems.

As Rainer said, "When contact is made its usually in reaction mode to the situation and issues - moreover, issues relating to the cultural competency of these services often impedes good prognosis and help."

That as with other sociao-economic and cultural-political areas; "health and community care we once again find ourselves captured in-between the State and Federal governments fighting over dollars and responsibility.

Integrated structural reforms in Mental Health across Australia; "is an urgent matter that requires urgent bi-partisan support and heaps of funding".

Thanks to you as well Paul Morgan for writing such an insightful article. I wasn't aware that so many others felt the same. Wendy - have you ever wondered why youngsters turn to drugs? Has it ever occurred to you that the reason is that those who are predisposed to mental illness are predisposed to compulsive behaviour? Has it ever occurred to you that those anxious feelings that have these youngsters closing down are so unbearable that they seek relief in substance abuse? Has it ever occurred to you that their parents and family pay taxes too and deserve fairer treatment? We have ramps and car spaces for the physically disabled; but the mentally disabled usually have nothing but whisperings and cold, heartless stares. Be nice.

Just a couple of points,
1. Tank you Paul for your accurate assesment of the situation, a very good piece, which cover the whole issue.
2. Those who are blaming Wendy, please go back and look at her contribution, and you will see she posted it for Kerry Davis, who obviously has no compassion for the mentally ill, and whose main concern is the almighty dollar.
3. Those who critisise Tony Abbott, Federal Health Minister, should know that he along with his boss {Abbott/Howard team} cut Fereral Funding in Health last year to the States by nearly $1 billion dollars over 5 years in the Federal/State funding Agreement, so it is demonstrable how much Tony Abbott care about the average Australian's health in general, and to asign this aspect of health to his Parliamentry Secretery, mental health in particular.
4. It's time the stigma was removed I haven't noticed any change in community opinion since Jeff Kennett accepted the highly paid job, with the clayton's organision Beyond Blue, Kennett is just another social elite akin to Abbot/Howard and don't really care what happens to mentally ill people as demonstrated by last year's cuts in funding to the States, where was Kennett then?

Wendy- sorry I misunderstood. Thanks shonga for giving me the drum. Kerry, No one should suffer assault in the course of their business. I still stand by my earlier comment, however, I think, I know how angry and disempowered you must feel.
My daughter was bashed by a person who is mentally ill. We took him into our home and gave him shelter when he was couch surfing and living on the streets. I went out of my way to get him re-signed with Centrelink (he had spent 8 months witout income because he just could not in his mental state negotiate the system). Note: Centerlink didnt offer to reimburse him. The hospital doctor wrote up a report for her and the nurses suggested she press charges. The police contacted my daughter and took her statment. We rang the police a few months later to see what was going on, as my daughter had decided to leave it go. The police said that it was never going to proceed anyway. It is a difficult situation as we still love him - he has many endearing qualites - what is one to do?