Audio Name: Mental+health+2

Duration: 74 minutes
NT9443

[00:00:01]
DISCUSSION

Mental Health
➢ the overall mental state of well being.
Somebody could have great mental health or somebody could have poor mental health
due to a situation or something happening in their lives like stress which is often driven by the
work we do for the clients such as lack of funding, lack of resources and lack of person powers.

Two Major Systems of Diagnostic Classification

Diagnostic Statistical Manual(DSM)

➢ The DSM right now is on its fifth edition and it's got a controversial past. it's published by
the American Psychiatric Association and used only in North America. A few clinicians
like Flemington Health Centre do use the DSM. Now social workers use it to understand
the situations or the symptoms that their clients are facing.There have been instances in
the DSM where certain things were labelled as disorders but actually not being
disorders.
○ Example: In previous versions of the DSM homosexuality was listed as a
disorder, and through advocacy and awareness it's been removed.
○ The other controversial piece of the DSM was eating disorders took a while to be
recognised as actual mental illnesses. And again, through advocacy and
awareness and education they're now part of the DSM as well.
○ The other sort of controversy to the DSM is that it does not provide a worldview
of the client. It's really based on symptoms which can be Limiting such as having
issues with housing, income, their race which are not sort of a part of the DSM.

The International Classification of Diseases(ICG)

➢ The International Classification of Diseases(ICG) is used internationally. It's also used

by the World Health Organisation and it's used by Canada. It is currently using the ICD
10 and right now they're working on the 11th version. It is a good tool which provides
specific information about all the various mental health illnesses that exist.

➢ The problem with ICG though is that it's seen as promoting labelling and labelling leads
to discrimination. The labelling theory emerged from sociology and criminology. The
problem with labels is when we label someone, that label tends to define them.
 ○ Example: a person has schizophrenia, that person will then be labelled as
schizophrenic which is why language is so important when we're talking about
mental Health. In reality the world will make them feel that way so social service
workers working in mental health need to be mindful of labels. It is best to refer
to them as a person who's living with schizophrenia because they're more than
just their mental illness.
○ It's not just specific to mental health even in diabetes, it is very rare to see a
diabetes clinician who refers to their clients as diabetics.

Mental Illnesses

● Symptomatic Mental Disorders

○ Example: folks who have an acquired brain injury from an accident that
leads to developing something not they were predisposed to, like brain
injury acquired from a car accident or motorcycle accident which will then
have developed a mental disorder as a result of that trauma to the brain.
○ Sometimes we see the same with people who have a severe infection like
delirium, dementia which usually manifest as a result of mental illness.

● Concurrent disorders.
➢ are when there's a substance abuse problem, as well as a mental
disorder at the same time.
○ Example: folks who suffer from eating disorders, oftentimes will
have a substance abuse issue of sorts like cigarette smoking, and
using opioids or any type of drug.

● Bipolar disorder
➢ who have substance abuse issues and oftentimes the correlation could
be for very different reasons. Sometimes People will use the substance to
cope with their mental illness because they're undiagnosed.
○ Example: Drinking or drugs is like the medication that they
probably need. It gives them the same effect. Sometimes it's a
way of coping, and a way of dealing with the actual mental
disorder or the symptoms or just the stigma.

● Concurrent diagnosis
➢ It is common to people with anxiety and depression that are quite often
prone to be substance users like quick smokers who suffer from anxiety,
that impulse, that cold being and stress. These are all ways that people
cope and deal with what's happening to them.

● Schizophrenia Disorders
 ➢ Schizophrenia involves a psychosis, when somebody is starting to show
signs of schizophrenia, they usually do emerge during adolescence or
early adulthood, between the ages of like 18 and 23, maybe 25.
➢ Rarely schizophrenia develops younger than that like cases of babies
showing signs of schizophrenia.

● Neurotic Disorders
➢ neurotic disorders are stress related, so basically all the anxiety disorders
fall under this category such as generalised anxiety disorder, elder
phobias, OCD and obsessive compulsive disorder.
● behavioural syndromes
➢ behavioural syndromes associated with physiological disturbances and
physical factors like eating disorders, insomnia, sexual dysfunction fall
under this category.
● Eating disorders
➢ are one of the complex mental health illnesses.There are three major
eating disorders.
○ Anorexia Nervosa
○ Pollinia Nervosa
○ Binge eating disorder is the act of eating a lot of food in a short
period of time.

● Personality disorders.
➢ very complex mental health illnesses. Some of them are rare like
borderline personality disorder, narcissistic personality disorder etc..
They're difficult to diagnose, and they're also pretty difficult to treat. The
best treatment option or the most successful evidence based is
something called dialectical behavioural therapy.
○ Dialectical behavioural therapy.is a long treatment but it's actually
very successful in terms of helping folks to be able to navigate life,
society, have some good coping skills and have some good how
to set boundaries and all these different kinds of things that
oftentimes folks with personality disorders struggle with.
○ It is an add on tool that social workers and clinicians will take on to
be able to best effectively work with their clients.

● Disorders of psychological development.

➢ Is an incomplete development of the mind. Someone who's born with the
brain that's not fully developed.
○ Example: Autism is an impairment or delay, it's basically an
impairment in the psychological development of the brain which
causes impairments or delays in language.Mostly there are higher
rates of children who have autism or who are born with
developmental disabilities in lower income communities
● Emotional Disorders
➢ Separation anxiety which usually occur in children and adolescence.
○ There's been some sort of discrepancy in their development or in
their relationship with their parents which entrenched in the
development of the child. So if there's a positive relationship
between the child and the parent, then the development will thrive.
○ If a child is born to an orphanage or is being raised in an
orphanage and that child is not receiving affection or is not being
encouraged to develop actually impacts their development. It
causes behavioural and emotional disorders. Like certain
behavioural defiance disorders, and sometimes even more
complex sorts of illnesses.
● Specified Mental Disorder
➢ Somebody who shows symptoms that doesn't really necessarily fit into a
group. We see this also with eating disorders.