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This book seeks to integrate the history of mental health nursing with the wider history of institutional and community care for people experiencing mental illness and/or living with a learning disability. It develops new research questions by drawing together a concern with exploring the class, gender, skills and working conditions of practitioners with an assessment of the care regimes staff helped create and patients’ experiences of them. Contributors from a range of disciplines use a variety of source material to examine both continuity and change in the history of care over two centuries. The book benefits from a foreword by Mick Carpenter and will appeal to researchers and students interested in all aspects of the history of nursing and the history of care. The book is also designed to be accessible to practitioners and the general reader.
Conflict poses considerable challenges for services that support communities, and in particular those affected by violence. This book describes the work undertaken in Omagh against the background of the most recent period of violent conflict in Ireland, and specifically it draws upon the work following the Omagh bombing. The bombing came just four months after the Northern Ireland peace agreement, known formally as the Belfast Agreement of 1998, and more informally as the Good Friday Agreement. The book describes the impact of the bomb and the early responses. Local trade unions, employers and the business community played key roles at times, particularly in underlining the need for solidarity and in identifying themselves with the desire for peace. The book looks at the outcome of needs-assessments undertaken following the Omagh bombing. The efforts to understand the mental health and related impact of the violence associated with the Troubles in Northern Ireland over the period 1969 to 2015 are focused in detail. The later efforts to build services for the benefit of the wider population are described, drawing upon the lessons gained in responding to the Omagh bombing. The developments in therapy, in training and education, and in research and advocacy are described with reference to the work of the Northern Ireland Centre for Trauma and Transformation (NICTT). The book draws together key conclusions about the approaches that could be taken to address mental health and well-being as an essential component of a peace-building project.
Introduction Mental health problems are widespread, at times disabling, yet often hidden. In the UK, nearly half (43.4 per cent) of adults think that they have had a diagnosable mental health condition at some point in their life. One in six (17 per cent) of people over the age of 16 had a common mental health problem in the week prior to being interviewed (Mental Health Foundation, 2016 ). One in eight (12.8 per cent) of 5- to 19-year-olds had at least one mental disorder when assessed in 2017, and the prevalence of
10 The economics of mental health services Brendan Kennelly Introduction Mental health services include a broad range of services, from home and community-based facilities such as day hospitals and out-patient facilities, to acute care units and residential care services. This chapter presents a broad overview of key economic issues facing the provision of such services in Ireland. The key issues that are addressed include: (a) the nature and extent of mental illnesses in Ireland; (b) the resources spent on care provided to people with mental illnesses; and (c
14 The courts and mental health tribunals Protecting rights in mental health law: the relationship between the courts and mental health tribunals Darius Whelan Introduction Mental health law, and in particular the law concerning involuntary detention, has been a subject of protracted debate in Irish society. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) held in Winterwerp v. The Netherlands (1979–80) 2 EHRR 387 that, except in emergency cases, the decision to detain a ‘person of unsound mind’ must be supported by objective medical expertise, the mental disorder
Can contemporary developments in the life sciences help us understand the ways in which ‘adversity’ shapes mental health conditions in the heterogeneous conglomerations we call cities? Many have pointed to the evidence that those living in cities are more likely to be diagnosed with mild, moderate and severe mental disorders than those living in rural settings. But it has proved difficult to identify precisely what it is in the urban experience that leads to these elevated rates. The same is true of research that has addressed urban mental health in migrant and
1 Mental health nursing: the working lives of paid carers from 1800 to the 1990s Anne Borsay and Pamela Dale At the beginning of the twenty-first century mental health issues are being debated at a local, national and international level.1 Positively, there is an argument that the global promotion of mental well-being will deliver benefits ranging from personal fulfilment to improved public health. Yet there remain significant concerns about the social and economic costs of mental illness, which fall on individuals, families and communities. Interestingly
referrals to a mental health department: 2001 An audit of referrals for psychiatric services to the Mater Hospital Belfast, which continues to serve an area deeply affected by the years of violence and characterised by significant socio-economic and cultural divisions, and deprivation, was undertaken by Curran and Miller. They found that ‘only 6% of referrals and admissions had as
findings have been found in relation to children through studies undertaken over the same period. The overview reveals that, following a period of apparently little evidence of the impact of the violence on the mental health of the population, it was not until the 1980s that substantive evidence of the impact of the years of violence began to build. Also, research began to reveal something of the dynamics of
Within months it was very clear that the bombing had been a significant stressor in the life of the community. The implications for mental health and well-being were a matter of concern – but poorly defined, and it was not known what the longer-term consequences would be. To ensure that the right type, amount and duration of services would be in place to address the