Involuntary Treatment
Involuntary hospitalization is a legal procedure used to require individuals with mental health disorders to receive treatment withoaut their care. I am addressing this topic because there is an enormous problem in the medical field with treatment care. Involuntary health care treatment should not be forced upon because it can cause more harm than damage.
Kendra’s Law was passed in 1999 and is a New York law concerning involuntary outpatient commitment. It grants judges the authority to issue orders that require people who meet certain criteria to regularly undergo psychiatric treatment. This is part of the problem with involuntary treatment. Tahe issue with Kendra’s law is that it is unconstitutional. At the Matter v. Storer case, the New York Court of Appeals recognized that the patient had the right to choose/ refuse treatment over the doctor. Therefore, forcing someone to go to a mental treatment facility is unconstitutional. Kendra’s Law is just something that the court uses when they don’t want to let someone who has a mental illness out on the street.
One of the main issues is that patients tend to suffer from anosognosia. Anosognosia is a condition in
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which the patient’s brain believes that they are not ill when they really are. This serves as the problem to patients who are mentally ill because when doctors try to help them, they get defensive. It then creates the issue that patients do not want to be helped when they need it, which then makes the time for treatment longer than it should be. Another main issue with involuntary treatment is that when the patient is unwilling to go get help, forcing them to go can cause more harm to them and the people trying to treat them. In the patient’s mind, they believe that something bad is happening to them so they begin to hallucinate and they can act violently because of that hallucination. In Vermont, a patient with schizophrenia was forced to go to the Rutland Regional Medical Center where he started to have delusions about being in a street gang. He attacked two employees, one of which was left with traumatic brain damage. The patient was not on any medications until after the attacks happened. The patient had not made any attacks before he was transferred to the medical center, so it is safe to assume that putting him through that treatment didn’t improve his help. He was forced to be put in a facility that was unknown to the patient and was full of people that the patient didn’t know, which most likely caused his delusions. This case could have been worse because the patient could have killed any of the other employees or even killed himself. Thankfully, that didn’t happen but it could have. Transferring that patient only made his health worse and this is what normally happens with patients who are involuntarily committed. Involuntary treatment wastes money that it could be using on other parts of the medical field. It is hard to determine the exact cost because each case is different, but it does cost a lot of money on just one person. If the treatment doesn’t work and the patient gets worse, that money is now wasted and it could have gone towards something that could have helped save a person. In the previous paragraph, the medical center spent over $2,000 on the man who was committed. Since the treatments didn’t work, they let the man go home. But that money could have been used elsewhere had they not committed the man unwillingly. Since most mental health cases end up almost the same was as this one did, it would be smart if we set a limit on how long and how much money you should be able to spend on each person. Another issue with involuntary treatment is the release of a patient. When the patient is released, they usually seem to be in a better state than when they entered the facility. Dr. Lloyd Sederer, a psychiatric doctor, wrote about how he committed a patient of his. He was not told when the patient was released and was discovered, without a weapon, casing the doctor’s home. The man was sent back to a medical facility and eventually treated with many medications. The same things have happened on many other occasions. One incident happened when the patient made many suicide attempts. The doctor committed the man and when he was released, made a grave suicide attempt that would have killed him had he not been accidentally discovered. The same results in almost every case. Unless under heavy medication and kept on watch 24/7. Involuntary treatment also causes a patient to feel as if their rights are violated. In the previous paragraph, many of the patients did not want to see their doctor because he had committed them. Many patients feel like they no longer have rights because the treatment is involuntary. Had they been given the option and been told what could have been done to help the patient, they might have considered going. But because they were forced to undergo treatment, the process took longer than it would have if the patient had gone voluntarily. The last issue with involuntary commitment is the use of medication. As stated in the previous paragraph(s), most treatments use medications to solve the issue of the mental illness. This wouldn’t be a huge issue if the patient didn’t have to rely on the medication. When a doctor first puts the patient on a medication, they have to prescribe a heavy dosage and then slowly take it away. The doctor has to be careful while shrinking the dosage and also to be careful about how much they give the patient to start with. The medication could become addicting to the patient and when they are finally off of the medicine, they return to their old ways or get into a worse condition. Once the patient is off of the medication, they might not have any immediate effects but they could eventually feel side effects because they believe that they need it to live and need it to make sure that they don’t slip back into their old ways. When patients think too hard, that can actually cause them to think that something is wrong with them when there actually isn’t. Now, even though there are many negatives, there are some positives.
The first is that the patient does get treated at some point. They might slip back into their illness but at some point, most of the patients have gotten better or fully recovered. This is beneficial to the patient’s health and the health of those around them. A study was shown that the total number of patients who don’t undergo psychiatric treatment could commit around 1,000 murders each year. There is a number that is smaller than that because even though patients who go to treatment get treated, some relapse. Also, if doctors didn’t put the patients on medications, they could potentially hurt themselves and the people around them. Medications do help the treatment process, but the dosage amount is
debatable. Overall, involuntary treatment should not be allowed. Even though there are positives, you can easily counter the argument. Society claims that they use this method to treat a patient’s health but in reality, it makes it worse. Think about if this was your child or a close friend or relative. If they had a mental illness, would you sit by and watch their health decrease in some medical facility? Or would you want them to heal on their own and eventually seek out professional help?
As a result of the lack of regulation in state mental institutions, most patients were not just abused and harassed, but also did not experience the treatment they came to these places for. While the maltreatment of patients did end with the downsizing and closing of these institutions in the 1970’s, the mental health care system in America merely shifted from patients being locked up in mental institutions to patients being locked up in actual prisons. The funds that were supposed to be saved from closing these mental institutions was never really pumped back into treating the mentally ill community. As a result, many mentally ill people were rushed out of mental institutions and exposed back into the real world with no help where they ended up either homeless, dead, or in trouble with the law. Judges even today are still forced to sentence those in the latter category to prison since there are few better options for mentally ill individuals to receive the treatment they need. The fact that America, even today, has not found a proper answer to treat the mentally ill really speaks about the flaws in our
Solitary Confinement is a type of isolation in prison which a prisoner is segregated from the general population of the prison and any human contact besides the prison employees. These prisons are separated from the general population to protect others and themselves from hurting anyone in the prison. These prisoners are deprived of social interaction, treatments, psychologist, family visits, education, job training, work, religious programming and many other services prisoners might need during the sentence of their imprisonment. There are roughly 80,000 prisoners in solitary confinement but 25,000 are in long term and supermax prisons. According to the Constitution, “The Eighth Amendment [...] prohibits the federal government from imposing excessive bail, excessive fines, or cruel and unusual punishment”(US Const. amend. VIII). Solitary confinement is suppose to be the last straw for inmates to be in. If they don 't follow it, they can be on death row. Taxpayers pay roughly $75,000 to $85,000 to keep prisoners in solitary confinement. That is 3 times higher than the normal prisons that taxpayers pay for them to be in prison. Solitary confinement was established in 1829 in Philadelphia for experimentation because officials believed it was a way for
The fight for improved health care for those with mental illness has been an ongoing and important struggle for advocates in the United States who are aware of the difficulties faced by the mentally ill and those who take care of them. People unfortunate enough to be inflicted with the burden of having a severe mental illness experience dramatic changes in their behavior and go through psychotic episodes severe enough to the point where they are a burden to not only themselves but also to people in their society. Mental institutions are equipped to provide specialized treatment and rehabilitative services to severely mentally ill patients, with the help of these institutions the mentally ill are able to get the care needed for them to control their illness and be rehabilitated to the point where they can become a functional part of our society. Deinstitutionalization has led to the closing down and reduction of mental institutions, which means the thousands of patients who relied on these mental institutions have now been thrown out into society on their own without any support system to help them treat their mental illness. Years after the beginning of deinstitutionalization and after observing the numerous effects of deinstitutionalization it has become very obvious as to why our nation needs to be re-institutionalized.
As medical advances are being made, it makes the treating of diseases easier and easier. Mental hospitals have changed the way the treat a patient’s illness considerably compared to the hospital described in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.
Few issues will motivate Americans to put down their cheeseburgers and pick up a shotgun faster than the threat of infringement upon their civil liberties. The right to choose what toothpaste to buy, what color socks to wear with those sandals, or what spiritual doctrine to follow, is fiercely defended by both conservatives and liberals alike. In fact, this commitment to personal liberty is what defines us as Americans, and sets us apart from the rest of the world (even if only in our own minds). This attitude is embodied in our presidential rhetoric:
If someone who has been diagnosed with a mental illness is arrested, they need to be evaluated by a psychiatrist to determine their mental competency. Furthermore, everyone who is arrested and suspected of having a mental illness should be evaluated by a psychiatrist. If the psychiatrist diagnoses the person with severe mental illness (such as schizophrenia or bipolar), that can cause a person to hear, see, or believe things that aren’t real, then that person should be sent to a treatment facility, such as the Pathways center in the book. This policy would keep people who suffer from severe mental illnesses from being in prisons, which would allow more room for criminals, and give applicable and better treatment to the people with the mental illnesses that they would not receive in the jails. It may also save money (Belluck,
This law allows an individual to keep more of their civil liberties. It cost less than an inpatient commitment. The law has control not only on the individual who needs help but also on the mental health system to give the help. Involuntary commitment is a court order in which an individual with a severe mental illness is order into treatment in an impatient or outpatient hospital. The laws, that deals with the criteria for civil commitment varies from state to state. A dander to self or a danger to others is a standard, but some may result in that the danger must be imminent. The Kendra’s law is a way to try to establish a safety living style for the community for all.
As science has evolved, so have treatments for mental illnesses have over time. The medical model is described as the view that psychological disorders are medical diseases with a biological origin (King, 2010, pg. 413). Abnormal behavior that categorizes some disorders can be impacted by biological factors such as genes, psychological factors such as childhood experiences, and even sociocultural factors such as gender and race (King, 2010). Treatments such as psychosurgery (lobotomy) , drug therapy (pharmaceuticals), electroconclusive therapy, and psychoanalysis are used to treat a wide range of psychological disorders. Back then, the public’s negative views on mental illnesses also went as far to associate with the people who treated it; psychiatrists. “Nunnally (1961) found that the public evaluated professionals who treated mental disorders significantly more negatively than those who treat physical disorders,” (Phelan, Link, Stueve, & Pescosolido, 2000, pg. 189). People back then didn’t see the point in “paying to be told that they were crazy”. However, in today’s society, it is now acceptable to seek help from psychiatric professionals; we are seeing more and more people seek mental health treatment. “In terms of facility-based records of utilization (Manderscheid and Henderson 1998), the data suggest that the rate of utilization of professional mental health services has at least doubled and maybe tripled, between the 1950’s and today,” (Phelan, Link, Stueve, & Pescosolido, 2000, pg. 189). In the 1950’s, neuroleptic drugs like Thorazine were introduced to treat the symptoms of schizophrenia. These drugs block a neurotransmitter called dopamine from getting to the brain, which in turn reduce schizophrenic symptoms, however there are some side effects such as substantial twitching of the neck, arms, and legs, and even dysphoria or lack of pleasure. (King, 2010, pg.
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.
Solitary confinement is a mandated arrangement set up by courts or prisons which seek to punish inmates by the use of isolated confinement. Specifically, solitary confinement can be defined as confinement in which inmates that are held in a single cell for up to twenty-three hours a day without any contact with the exception of prison staff (Shalev, 2011). There are several other terms which refer to solitary confinement such as, administrative segregation, supermax facilities (this is due to the fact that supermax facilities only have solitary confinement), the hotbox, the hole, and the security housing unit (SHU). Solitary confinement is a place where most inmates would prefer not to go. There are many reasons for this.
The United States of America, we have a plethora of laws, those of which may vary in importance; however, the current laws attending to the mentally ill do not suffice. Currently the most justifiable laws for this group are the Constitutional Guidelines, which state
The United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world and of that over sixty percent of jail inmates reported having a mental health issue and 316,000 of them are severely mentally ill (Raphael & Stoll, 2013). Correctional facilities in the United States have become the primary mental health institutions today (Adams & Ferrandino, 2008). This imprisonment of the mentally ill in the United States has increased the incarceration rate and has left those individuals medically untreated and emotionally unstable while in jail and after being released. Better housing facilities, medical treatment and psychiatric counseling can be helpful in alleviating their illness as well as upon their release. This paper will explore the increasing incarceration rate of the mentally ill in the jails and prisons of the United States, the lack of medical services available to the mentally ill, the roles of the police, the correctional officers and the community and the revolving door phenomenon (Soderstrom, 2007). It will also review some of the existing and present policies that have been ineffective and present new policies that can be effective with the proper resources and training. The main objective of this paper is to illustrate that the criminalization of the mentally ill has become a public health problem and that our policy should focus more on rehabilitation rather than punishment.
Wouldn’t it be completely irrational to sentence every mentally ill individual to jail purely because they suffered from a mental illness? Often, mentally ill people behave in an eccentric manner and allure the attention of police officers who do not differentiate the mentally ill from mentally stable people and immediately charge them with misdemeanors. There are approximately 300,000 inmates, with the number increasing every year, which suffer from a mental illness and do not receive proper treatment. Jails are not adequately equipped to care for mentally ill inmates, which can lead to an escalation of an inmate’s illness. Society has failed to provide enough social resources for citizens suffering from psychiatric illnesses in its community, transferring mentally unstable individuals between mental institutions and jails, when in fact adequate aid such as providing proper medication, rehabilitation opportunities, and more psychiatric hospitals in communities is a necessity to reconstitute these individuals.
Several states authorize police officers to arrest mentally ill people who have not broken any law. It is argued that this process is a way to promote public order. Hospitals also transfer mentally ill patients to jail in order to deal with the overflow. It is not uncommon for children to be confined to criminal detention centers because there is a lack of facilities for severely mentally ill children. Relying on the criminal justice systems to be surrogate mental health systems conflicts with the basic notions of justice. (Aufderheide,
According to Szasz (2005), “In principle, the mental patient is considered competent (until proven [otherwise]). In practice, the client is regularly treated as if he were incompetent and the psychiatrist who asserts that he needs treatment is treated as if he were the patient’s guardian” (p.78). During the 1940’s patients who were mentally ill were considered “legally incompetent” when committed into a mental health facility. Relatives of the patients could release them by providing care in their homes for the client. Unfortunately, Szasz (2005) claims, that “the treatment of mental diseases is no more successful today than it was in the past” (p.78).