17 May 2010
What are the barriers to recovery?
Last month I was lucky enough to attend and present at the Building Bridges Conference in Wellington, and I felt compelled to blog on one of the prevailing issues – are we any closer to working collaboratively within our communities and services to achieve the best possible outcomes for people with experience of mental illness?
It seems fitting that the name of this conference – Building Bridges - was also a reflection of one of the growing concerns voiced by a number of delegates and presenters that there was still an absence of ‘bridges’ or, should I say, collaboration across sectors, regions and various philosophical/political approaches. It seems the ‘mental health sector’ (and other areas of health, labour and social welfare) still has a long way to go before we can say we are all working together.
The theme of the conference was Evolving Communities Beyond Services, and this idea of responding to mental distress beyond the scope of simple service provision was resounding throughout the three days.
From a Like Minds perspective, this is great to hear because when we look at mental distress from a social and prevention perspective, it is vitally important to acknowledge the impact of the wider social context to recovery. This includes being able to access opportunities – like employment, education, housing and vocational training – as well as events within the community that link us to our social environment, make us feel included and provide us with a sense of wellbeing.
What do you think? What are the barriers to us all working together?
Vanessa Cooper, Mental Health Promoter – Like Minds, Like Mine
Comments
Posted by Colin Slade 2:47 pm, 17 May 2010 Reply
Kia Ora Vanessa and all.
Crikey, I didn't even know there was a blog here! Shows how preoccupied I must have been while helping organise the conference!
Thanks for raising this vital subject and I look forward to seeing some lively posts. Readers may like to know that a number of presentations from the Building Bridges Conference including keynotes (and your own!)are available on the website (that we are hoping to keep going as a permanent site) at
Best wishes
Posted by Paul Emery 2:59 pm, 17 May 2010 Reply
Constant concerns about services being in direct competition with regards to funding are still relevant to the development of cooperation between services. In these current recessional times, when some services have to cut back whilst others are maintaining or perhaps thriving, there is bound to be some issues around trust, even though we are basically all wanting the same outcomes for the people we support.
That said, we need to communicate more openly in order to gain the trust, which is happening, slowly. Services are beginning to cooperate, but there is still a long way to go. The sharing of ideas and information, supporting events and presentations where knowledge is shared needs to be supported more enthusiastically. It is happening with social/sporting events but shared information around the board table, now that would be an interesting!
Posted by Miriam 3:35 pm, 17 May 2010 Reply
I agree with Paul - it's the competitive side of things - but I think it extends deeper than competition for funding. it's also competition for clients who have limited funds to spare on services. There's also so many different professions and modalities, each with its own standards, each trying to be right, each talking a different language.
The main barrier though is knowledge - people don't know enough about the services that are out there or how they can be accessed. How can we cooperate if we don't know we each exist? And then a step further than that - we also need to know how we are able to help eachother.
Maybe, though, mental health service providers find it difficult to ask for help or know when they need it. Somethin common with service-users perhaps? Maybe service-providers could learn a thing or two from people who are living recovery and learn how and when to ask for help.
Posted by Vanessa Cooper 3:49 pm, 17 May 2010
Yes, interesting points... There is the competitive contracting, silos of knowledge, and the barrier of knowing what services are out there and how they can work together. I think we also need to address the philospohical differences underpinning organisations. Recovery is not just a buzz word - as Jim Burdett once said (paraphrased) - we have changed the location of services but the style of work with people with experience of mental illness has not really shifted - ...
Its an interesting point you raise Miriam, with the roll out of whanau ora, and an increasing focus on working collaboratively, how do we do this without the knowledge of other services?! I know when i worked in Supported Employment it was full on just knowing who and how and what else was out there - and that was just employment related services!
Posted by Shona 3:47 pm, 17 May 2010 Reply
Hi,
I think the way services are structured are a barrier to collaboration. Mental health and illness is influenced by social and environmental factors but often mental health services can't address these.
I like the idea that services could be structured to more holistically address the things that cause and influence mental health.
Posted by Vanessa Cooper 4:14 pm, 17 May 2010 Reply
Great point Shona!
Services are currently geared towards fixing the individual, rather than the context that contributes to mental un-wellness. Again i am thinking about the philosophy of a whanua ora approach in which the family is a seen as a whole and to deal with just one part, issue, or person is an inadequate approach.