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Concept paper about mental health awareness
Concept paper about mental health awareness
Concept paper about mental health awareness
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Mental illness is an increasing problem in America. Currently about 26.2% of Americans suffer from a mental disorder. A mental illness/disorder is a medical condition that disrupts a person’s thinking, feeling, mood, and ability to relate to others and daily functions. Mental illness can affect humans of any age, race, gender and socioeconomic status. However the care that is needed to effectively cure and help the people affected by the illness is not equal for everyone here in American, especially for African Americans. Health care for mental illness is an issue in the African American community for Men, Women and Adolescents due to the underserving and lack of mental healthcare providers, the cultural stigma of having mental illness and the socioeconomic status of African Americans. The African American community is suffering with the issue of inadequate mental health care for many decades. There is a deep lack of understanding about what mental illness is and there are many barriers that hinder African Americans from receiving the care that they need. People are unaware of the effects of mental illness, and what mental illness can encompass. “Most importantly, mental health includes people’s feelings of worth in the context of the total cultural and societal system as well as within the identifiable groups to which they belong.” (Snowden, 165) The experience you receive as a race and how you perceive your race is apart of mental illness. Many African American people look down upon their race due to socioeconomic hierarchy that society has given people. African American’s are at high risk to developing mental illness. Healthcare providers have misdiagnosed many African Americans due to lack of knowledge. “African Americans in ... ... middle of paper ... ...3. Abstract. EBSCO eBook Collection. Web. . NAMI. "African American Community Mental Health." NAMI. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Mar. 2014. . Snowden, Lonnie R. Barriers to Effective Mental Health Services for African Americans. N.p.: n.p., 2001. Print. Mental Health Services Research 4. Stagman, Shannon, and Janice L. Cooper. "Children's Mental Health." WWW.nccp.org. Ed. Columbia University. Columbia University, n.d. Web. 14 Mar. 2014. . Ward, Earlise C. African American Women's Beliefs about Mental Illness, Stigma, and Preferred Coping Behaviors. Madison: Wiley Periodicals, 2009. Print. Willie, Charles V., Bernard M. Kramer, and Bertram S. Brown, eds. Racism Racism Racism and Mental Health. N.p.: Univerity of Pittsburgurgh Press, 1973. Print. Contemporary Community Health Series.
Mental health care disparities can be rooted in inequalities in access to good providers, differences in insurance coverage, or discrimination by health professionals in the clinical encounter (McGuire & Miranda, 2008). Surely, those who are affected by these disparities are minorities Blacks and Latinos compare to Whites. Due to higher rates of poverty and poor health among United States minorities compared with whites. Moreover, the fact that poverty and poor health are
Jewelll, N., & Russell, K. (1992). Current health status of african americans. Journal of community health nursing, 9(3), 161-169.
Mental healthcare has a long and murky past in the United States. In the early 1900s, patients could live in institutions for many years. The treatments and conditions were, at times, inhumane. Legislation in the 1980s and 1990s created programs to protect this vulnerable population from abuse and discrimination. In the last 20 years, mental health advocacy groups and legislators have made gains in bringing attention to the disparity between physical and mental health programs. However, diagnosis and treatment of mental illnesses continues to be less than optimal. Mental health disparities continue to exist in all areas of the world.
Cook, D. & Helms, J. (1999). Using race and culture in counseling and psychotherapy. Needham Heights, Massachusetts: A Viacom Company.
"African American Communities and Mental Health." Mental Health America. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 May 2014. .
During slavery, African American women were the ones that stayed home all day and cooked and cleaned for their families. These women were always told to just keep quiet and believe in God or their religious belief through everything they were going through. African American women didn’t have a voice in society so they couldn’t express their feelings like others could. This cultural aspect of African American women, just going through life and not being able to express themselves has contributed to many of the ladies suffering from depression. Depression amongst African women is very high because of past cultural experiences. African American women are one of the major groups of people that have sacristy of resources. Many times when African American women go to their doctors the doctors tend to diagnose them incorrectly or some time even give them the wrong treatment (Carrington, C. H. ,2006). African American when were always made to just deal with the problem that they were going through at the time not matter the mood they were in (Carrington, C. H.
...quently diagnosed with schizophrenia than other races, which can primarily be attributed to misdiagnosis. This misdiagnosis is a result of diagnostic tools that fail to properly take cultural differences into consideration, as well as a lack of education on how to interpret these cultural differences. African-Americans are also less likely to seek and receive specialized treatment for cultural and economic reasons. Black patients benefit most from treatment by those in their own ethnic group, as well as clinicians with a mindful awareness of cultural differences and the justified mistrust of psychiatric care. Going forward greater research and attention should be given to the kinds of treatments that work best for African Americans. Improved education of clinicians will also help curb misdiagnosis and elevate the mistrust felt within the African American community.
Williams, D. R., & Jackson, P. (2014, April 1). Health Affairs. Social Sources Of Racial Disparities In Health. Retrieved April 29, 2014, from http://content.healthaffairs.org/content/24/2/325.short
Fischer, A. R., & Shaw, C. (1999). African americans mental health and perceptions of racist discrimination: The moderating effects of racial socialization experiences and self-esteem. Journal of Counseling Psychology,46(3), 395-407. Retrieved from psycnet.apa.org/journals/cou/46/3/395.html
Racial Discrimination is a detrimental stressor among African Americans (Sellers et al., 2003). As a result, African Americans are more likely to be faced with poorer mental and physical health outcomes. There has been research conducted relating to African Americans’ experience with racial discrimination. Specifically African Americans exposed to racial discrimination are likely to experience multiple externalizing outcomes, including anger aggressive behavior and delinquency (e.g., Kang & Burton, 2014). Given these negative outcomes of racial discrimination, it is important to identify factors that are protective against racial discrimination. Racial identity is defined as the importance of race to African Americans as well as the meaning
People with serious socio-emotional and emotional disturbances are challenged in many aspects of life. Historically people of color with serious mental health related issues had little assistance and chances to having their needs met equally to Whites. In order to properly or adequately address the emotional and mental wellbeing of everyone on an equal basis, the stigma association must be removed from people of color.
Whaley, A. L. (1997). Ethnic and racial differences in perceptions of dangerousness of persons with mental illness. Psychiatric Services, 48, 1328-1330.
Nearly 44 million American adults, and millions of children, experience mental health conditions each year, including depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and post-traumatic stress. This month, we renew our commitment to ridding our society of the stigma associated with mental illness, encourage those living with mental health conditions to get the help they need, and reaffirm our pledge to ensure those who need help have access to the support, acceptance, and resources they deserve. Our Nation has made strong advances in improving prevention, increasing early intervention, and expanding treatment of mental illnesses. And because of more than $100 million in funding from the Affordable Care Act, community health centers have expanded behavioral health services for nearly 900,000 people nationwide over the past 2 years. Still, far too few Americans experiencing mental illnesses do not receive the care and treatment they need. During National Mental Health
Without explicitly stating this, it would be exceptionally easy for the community to overlook the importance of multicultural inclusion in mental health care. Minorities are not part of the elite system that holds the stigma to its current influential standard, but in a largely white community with all white therapists, it could still feel uncomfortable to reach out for help. Integrated into the intervention to eliminate the stigma around mental health in the community should be a lesson that mental illnesses can happen to everyone regardless of race (I am sure we have all heard the myth that eating disorders are unique to white girls), and on the reverse side, reminding the more close-minded citizens of the community that their perceived status is not lowered just because they are getting treatment for the same thing a person of color or lower socioeconomic status is. The best way to get this community to believe you is by letting them experience it themselves, which circles us back around to beginning with using advocacy as an eliminator of the stigma surrounding mental health care. Making people comfortable enough to try something for themselves will change their perceptions and fuel the community organizing intervention even
Parents were asked whether or not they have been personally afflicted by racism and whether or not people they know have been afflicted by racism (O’Brien Caughy, O'Campo, & Muntaner, 2004). It was found that “parents who denied experiencing racism had the highest behavioral problems among their children” (O’Brien Caughy, O'Campo, & Muntaner, 2004). The parents who denied having been personally discriminated against were more apt to have children who suffered from anxiety and depression in this study (O’Brien Caughy, O'Campo, & Muntaner, 2004). Those who confronted their own personal experiences with racism were less likely to have children who suffered from mental