The NY Times has a sad story about the death of a young woman who worked in a group home for people with mental illness. One of the residents, a man suffering from schizophrenia, killed her. The focus of the article, however, is not so much about the death but how this situation could occur, that is, is the mental health delivery system that is supposed to be operating failing both the clients and service providers? Quoting from the article:
|After Ms. Moulton’s funeral drew hundreds of mourners, the |mental health commissioner convened a task force to review |the system’s safety and training practices. | |At the first of a series of statewide hearings, in a cavernous |college auditorium in Fitchburg, several panel members expressed |discomfort with their mission. | |“The overwhelming majority of consumers are not more dangerous |than the general population, although there is a very small group |that does cause concern,” said Dr. Kenneth Appelbaum, a co-chairman |of the task force. “How to go about addressing safety concerns |without adding stigma is a challenge.” | |Rising to address the panel, Laurie Martinelli, the executive |director of the National Alliance on Mental Illness in Massachusetts, |said the issue raised by Ms. Moulton’s case — and by the subsequent |killing of a homeless shelter employee — was not whether people |with mental illness were violent. | |“The elephant in the room is the state mental health budget,” she said. | “Did the murders have something to do with funding cutbacks?” | |The “historical budget levels” posted on the department’s Web site |show a nearly 10 percent decline in appropriations for mental health |from 2009 through 2011. Additional information requested for this |article — on midyear cuts, budget supplements and trust fund |spending — indicates that the money available to the department |probably declined somewhat less, by about 6 percent. | |Joellen Stone, a client of the department trained to help others |with mental illness, told the panel that the people she counsels are |living in “utter poverty — in apartments with bed bugs and rats and |drug dealers in the hall.” | |“They’re closing hospitals, and people are ending up in nursing |homes or substandard housing. It just saddens me,” she said. |“If we don’t get funding, we’re either on the street, in prison, dead |or rather be dead. And when people are disempowered, that’s when |they’re likely to become violent.” http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/us/17MENTAL.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha2&pagewanted=all Something to think about when talking about abnormal/clinical psychology. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=11031 or send a blank email to leave-11031-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
