Discussing race, racism and mental health: two mental health inquiries reconsidered (original) (raw)
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International Journal of Mental Health, 2008
Background: Despite changes in legislation to prohibit racial discrimination and improve race relations, black men in the United Kingdom repeatedly find themselves confronted with limited situations from which there appears to be no avoidance or escape. Material: This qualitative study attempts to gain some understanding of the process of becoming ill from the interviewees' point of view. The study was conducted in two different mental health-care settings situated in the South London area. A grounded theory approach to the date collection and analysis was used to elucidate this experience. The criteria for inclusion were that participants had to identify themselves as being black, male, over the age of 18, and living with severe mental illness. Eleven men who fulfilled the criteria agreed to be interviewed and have their interviews tape-recorded and transcribed. The transcriptions were analysed thematically for constructs that indicated how they came to be detained under the Mental Health Act of 1983. Discussion: Seven themes are revealed within the narratives of participant patients, (i.e., place of origin, sex, age, family and friends, education, work, and initial and most recent admission to hospital). The narratives provide evidence in support of the view that black men detained under the Mental Health Act usually have great insight into the reality of their own lived-worlds, but they are less likely to receive psychological interventions to help clarify and resolve issues that had arisen and are, therefore, at risk of readmission. Conclusions: Black men detained under the Mental Health Act presented with psychological issues that might be best addressed by suitably trained psychological therapist as opposed to medication.
Mental Health and Social Inclusion, 2020
Purpose This paper aims to examine three recent papers on psychosis and social inclusion in relation to people of Black African and African Caribbean heritage in the UK and the USA. Design/methodology/approach A search was carried out for recent papers on psychosis and social inclusion in relation to people of Black African and African Caribbean heritage in the UK and the USA. I selected three papers addressing this theme from different angles. Findings The first paper extends previous findings (that psychosis can follow traumatic events) to Black Americans and includes the contribution of societal inequalities and racism. The second paper illustrates Black men’s experiences of mental health services for psychosis in the UK. It finds, not surprisingly, that a lack of listening combined with coercive use of medication reduces trust in services. The third paper offers hope in reporting collaborative work with people of Black African Caribbean heritage in the UK to culturally adapt fam...
The Department of Health has stated for the past six years its intention to review the guidelines for murder inquiries (Winchester, 2000). It still remains the case that the functions of such inquiries are not clear, particularly with regard to issues of race and ethnicity. To illustrate this point, the inquiry team often includes a psychiatrist, a representative from social services, usually a senior social worker, and a nurse manager. The chair is always a lawyer. However, the ethnicity of the panel members and the relevant expertise that each brings to the inquiry are never made explicit, nor are factors relevant to race and ethnicity in the examination of the evidence. In some inquiry reports it is claimed that race and ethnicity issues were not significant factors in the final findings (see for example reports on the inquiries into the care and treatment
The International Handbook of Black Community Mental Health
2020
The International Handbook of Black Community Mental Health Endorsements "This Handbook is a landmark in our understanding of the mental health issues which challenge African-heritage populations in Europe (particularly in the UK and the Netherlands) and in North America-countries which imposed slavery on African populations. The racism which survives today is a perpetuation of the values which supported slavery: issues of labelling and victim-blaming continue, and take their toll on minority populations. The 40 activists, clinicians and scholars who contribute chapters to this handbook are well qualified and experienced in their specialist fields and bring their unique insights and knowledge on Black Community Mental Health issues to a Handbook which will be of great value for students, trainees, academics and practitioners from multidisciplinary backgrounds. The authors have also been ably guided and organised by the Handbook's three editors (two from the US, one from the UK). Overall, there is much quality in the writing, many insights, and bases for further action.
Racializing Mental Illness: Understanding African-Caribbean Schizophrenia in the UK
Critical Social Work, 2008
All multiracial societies have to grapple with the benefits versus the costs of the integration of minorities into majority communities. Indeed, in relation to the costs of integration, it could be argued that integration and assimilation increases non-White people’s exposure to racialized experiences and racism, which in turn predisposes them to mental illness. As such, it is worth considering the case of the UK, where Black integration and assimilation is particularly intense, and where the high rates of schizophrenia in the African-Caribbean population have been an area of concern for over three decades. This paper argues that the interplay between racial minority status stress, racism-induced stress, and racial bias in diagnosis may be significant factors influencing the high Black incidence rate of schizophrenia in the UK.
An exploratory note on discrimination and race in relation to mental health in the west
Medico Friend Circle Bulletin, 2014
The history of psychiatry shows that " race " has long been an influential concept in determining human behaviour, problems with living and their management and treatment. More recently, this history shows how systems of mental health provision and policy affect racialised 1 communities living in the west. For example, as late as 2003, an inquiry into the death of a 40-year old African Caribbean man, David Rocky Bennett led to an in-depth examination of mental health care in the UK. The report found the National Health Service to be " institutionally racist ". 2 Institutional racism was defined in an earlier inquiry into the murder of a young black man, Steven Lawrence, as " a feature of institutions where there are pervasive racist attitudes and practices, assumptions based on racial differences, practices and procedures which are discriminatory in outcome, if not in intent, and a tolerance or acceptance of such differences. " 3 In Western countries where there are substantial populations of people from communities and backgrounds other than indigenous/occupying white populations, racial discrimination interacts with structural (social, cultural) discrimination against people deemed mad or " mentally ill ". This multiple discrimination happens in several contexts affecting the practice and theory of psychiatry and mental health. We attempt to examine some of these contexts below in six sections: a) Racist underpinnings of the history and development of psychiatry; b) Racialised theories of the psyche, emotions and mental health/ill-health; c) Racism as cause and context for mental and emotional distress; d) Racial discrimination in relation to access of health and healing systems; e) Discrimination against alternative meanings and contexts of healing and health; and f) Multiple discrimination based on notions of 'race' and 'madness' within societies and communities.