Friday 18 November 2011

Mental health and employment

Mark Brown, editor of One-in-Four magazine has written an excellent feature of mental health and employment.  It is one of the few articles I have come across that speaks common sense on the role of work in mental health recovery.  Mark acknowledges that the journey back into work from secondary or primary care is not straightforward and that employment is not a panacea in itself.  As Mark says:

'For me, the most important thing to remember when discussing work and recovery is that work itself isn’t a magic four letter word; it’s everything that someone gains from being in work that is important'.

Mark Brown is the editor of One in Four magazine
For the full article:
http://www.oneinfourmag.org/index.php/mental-health-and-work-not-a-magic-four-letter-word/

Monday 14 November 2011

One in Four magazine

One in Four magazine has an excellent article about stigma.  Catherine Amey examines stigma from both sides.  The positive side of mental health stigma being challenged and the less positive side where an over-emphasis on stigma might be harmful for some people.

The One in Four project was conceived by Mark Brown and shaped by his personal experience of mental health difficulty.

The vision was to produce a magazine that inspires people with mental health difficulties to get the best out of life while challenging stereotypes and spreading information that would help everyone to understand mental health difficulty better.

Working with his colleagues at Social Spider CIC Mark developed One in Four as a magazine which approached mental health difficulty in a new way and challenged the stigma that people with mental health difficulties can feel; an aspirational lifestyle magazine covering common life experiences, ambitions and challenges in a way that is readable and relevant to all.

In December 2006, Social Spider secured funding from The Charlie Waller Memorial Trust and South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust Charitable Funds to produce a pilot issue of One in Four to be made available free through community outlets such as GPs’ surgeries, public libraries and places of treatment.

10,000 copies were distributed and the magazine was downloaded 7,000 times from this website – an estimated total readership of around 40,000. Feedback from online and offline surveys and focus groups was overwhelmingly positive with repeated acknowledgement of the magazine’s high production values; 90% said they wanted to read future issues and 75% gave it an approval rating better than 8/10.

As a result of this response, Social Spider has sought funding and developed partnerships and trading activities around the project to enable One in Four to launch as a regular quarterly magazine distributed throughout England.

There is currently no other independent, professionally produced magazine in the UK which is written for people with mental health difficulties and is written by them. Social Spider believes in the potential for One in Four to bring about positive change in the lives of its core audience, their friends, family and carers.

Aside from the money raised through sales of the magazine and other services One in Four is currently supported by Comic Relief, The Charlie Waller Memorial Trust, The South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust Charitable Funds and the Wates Foundation.

Catherine Amey’s book 'Psychosis through My Eyes: A Personal and Professional Journey'  is scheduled to be available as an ebook in September 2011 from Chipmunka Publishing.

Thursday 3 November 2011

Is anti-stigma the new stigma?

The 'Time to Change' campaign challenges stigma and discrimination against people with mental health conditions. Time to Change is helping groups and individuals organise activities which actively cooperate in challenging discriminatory attitudes and behaviours.

Challenging discrimination is achieved primarily through engaging in mainstream as a contributor, a consumer or a provider. Many people with mental health conditions access mainstream activities, making their own choices as to whether to disclose or not. The greatest impact in challenging mainstream can be achieved by prioritising individual goals and aspirations. Support is also available to access mainstream from mental health organisations and bridge builders or through personalisation and direct payments.

'Time to Change' seems to insist that all people with mental health conditions wish to disclose as part of their eligibility for mainstream life. In a recent campaign video the broadcaster and service user Stephen Fry asserts that stigma and the attitudes of society in general are the main roadblocks that hinder the self-development of people with mental health conditions.

But many individuals with mental health diagnoses are accessing mainstream life without stigma, whether they choose to disclose or not. Disclosure is really up to the individual and far from discouraging service users to use mainstream, many organisations are open to all and are accessed by people with mental health conditions every day of the week. These are not simply voluntary organisations or groups limited to the health or charity sectors. These are consumer providers of all kinds - art galleries, libraries, recording studios, performance venues, gyms, sports centres, retail outlets and many more. To assert these these organisations are discriminating simply isn't fair on these groups, nor is it a realistic assessment.

Where people with mental health conditions may lose out is in having the initial confidence to set on the journey back to mainstream. This is particularly true of those who have been in secondary care and who may have become habituated to the life that Pat Deegan calls 'a career in mental health'. Dr. Deegan is referring to the lack of hope, aspiration and goals that can set in with hospitalisation or a long-term condition.

People who play football who happen to have mental health conditions are footballers. They aren't required to be 'positive mental health footballers'. People who play guitar who happen to have mental health conditions are guitarists, not mental health guitarists. People who are arts tutors who have a mental health condition are arts tutors. By continuing to tag mental health on mainstream activities and aspirations there is a danger of recycling stigma and not allowing people to move into valued social roles.

Could anti-stigma be the new stigma?