Mental Health Overview, MHA, TIC

• Mental health is about a disturbance in stress coping, impacting thinking, mood, behavior, and overall functioning.

Causes of Mental Health Issues

• Genetic factors
• Biological factors like chemical imbalances
• Personality traits
• Environmental factors
• Social and cultural factors include poverty, discrimination, and isolation
• Stressful life events, especially if stress isn't managed healthily
• Mental illness, mental disorder, emotional illness, and psychiatric disorder are synonymous

Impact of Mental Health Disorders

• Mental health disorders affect people across all ages, cultures, education levels, and income levels.
• Onset often occurs in adolescence or young adulthood possibly due to childhood experiences and traumas.
• Childhood traumas or conflicts, when repressed, can cause mental health disorders.
• Repression involves keeping unpleasant or painful thoughts from the conscious mind.

Mental Health Wellness

• Mental health wellness is a state of mind allowing effective coping with daily stressors in socially acceptable ways.
• Wellness is influenced by inherited traits, childhood nurturing, and life circumstances.

Characteristics of Good Mental Health

• Ability to cope and recover from life's challenges.
• Capacity to handle normal stress, express and control emotions, and build relationships.
• Feeling competent, self-aware, and leading an independent life.
• Mentally healthy individuals experience emotions like anxiety, sadness, and grief but manage them effectively.

Supporting Clients with Mental Health Disorders

• Treat clients respectfully, avoid labels, and use person-first language.
• Encourage autonomy and recognize that clients may have impairments in some areas but not all.
• Adapt care to each client's strengths, preferences, personality, and care plan.
• Build trust with clients and families through communication.
• Offer choices in care to foster a sense of control and prevent withdrawal.
• Maintain confidentiality and respect client boundaries. Only discuss details with the healthcare team.
• Minimize stressors and monitor for signs of illness or distress.
• Create a safe, calm environment, and follow the care plan to prevent injuries or triggers.

The Importance of DIPPS

• Mild disorders cause fewer challenges compared to severe disorders.
• Severe disorders can cause distress, inability to function, and disruptive behaviors.
• Support workers should provide support and reassurance to clients and families.
• Clients and families may be sensitive to signs of disapproval or stigma.
• Using respectful, nonjudgmental, and accepting language/body language is imperative.
• Careful attention must be paid to verbal and nonverbal cues to avoid conveying disapproval.

Principles of Mental Health Care

• Follow the care plan and report ineffective measures to a supervisor
• Ensure safety, comfort, and a calming environment, acting as the client's advocate.
• Accept clients fully, avoiding judgments.
• Be patient and communicate calmly, avoiding loud or harsh tones.
• Build trust to reduce anxiety and promote trust.
• Encourage emotional expression.
• Monitor closely for changes in mood, behavior, or signs of illness.
• Promote responsibility for actions to build self-worth and confidence.
• Support adaptation toward healthier coping strategies.
• Provide consistency in routines to reduce stress and promote stability.

Team Care Approach

• The aim is to address both physical and emotional safety of clients
• Requires input from multiple health care team members.

Who's on the Team?

• Family Physician: May prescribe medications.
• Nurse: Provides ongoing care and monitoring.
• Occupational Therapist: Assists with relearning life skills.
• Social Worker: Resolves practical issues (e.g., employment).
• Support Worker: Provides daily support and assistance.
• Psychiatrists: Diagnose and prescribe medications.
• Psychologists/Psychotherapists: Focus on non-medication therapies.
• Indigenous Mental Health Providers: Use traditional or combined healing methods.

Possible treatment options

• Medications
• Psychotherapy helps explore thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
• Psychoanalysis explores unconscious conflicts behind mental health issues.
• Behavior Therapy modifies behaviors, not underlying causes.
• Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) provides problem-solving therapy teaching coping strategies.
• Group Therapy offers peer support in a guided group setting.
• Family Therapy addresses family conflicts with a mental health specialist.

Mental Health Act

• The B.C. Mental Health Act (MHA) outlines protocols for admission and treatment of individuals with mental health disorders.
• The MHA does not consider medical disorders under the act.
• Each province and territory has its own legislation regarding mental health.
• As a Health Care Assistant (HCA) in B.C., understanding the Act is essential.

Types of Admission under the MHA

• Voluntary Admission: Clients can consent to admission and leave at any time.
• Involuntary Admission: Clients may be admitted without consent if they pose a risk.
• Involuntary admission requires certification by two physicians within 48 hours, the order is valid for 30 days.
• For renewal, one physician can renew for 30 days, then the order can be renewed for three months, and finally for six months.
• Patients must be informed of their rights, including the right to a review panel, after each renewal.

Criteria for Involuntary Admission

• Seriously impairs ability to react appropriately to their environment or associate with others.
• Requires psychiatric treatment in or through a designated facility.
• There must be a need for care, supervision, and control to prevent deterioration or for the protection of themselves or others.

Rights of Involuntary Patients

• Right to be informed promptly of the reasons for detention.
• Right to contact a lawyer and request a review panel hearing.
• Right to access a second medical opinion.
• Involuntary patients can expect to “live” at the designated facility as outlined.
• Patients may be entitled to day or night passes, pending their clearance level and adherence to a strict return plan.
• Their pass may be revoked at any time.

AWOL Protocol

• When an involuntary patient leaves without authorization, it is referred to as "Absent Without Leave" (AWOL).
• First a full sweep THRICE.
• Notify the physician, site supervisor, and police.
• A warrant is issued and law enforcement is involved.
• Once apprehended, the patient returns to the facility.
• The existing careplan should be reassessed.

HCA Role and the MHA

• Advocate on behalf of clients to ensure they are aware of their rights.
• Monitor for any changes in behavior/condition.
• Support clients in understanding their rights and treatment plans.
• Provide compassionate care, respecting client's dignity and autonomy.
• Maintain confidentiality of client information.

Trauma-Informed Care (TIC)

• Is an approach that recognizes impact of trauma and its effects on individuals.
• Ensures a feeling of safety, support, and minimizing re-traumatization.
• It's essential to apply trauma-informed care to provide compassionate and effective support.

Trauma-Informed Care Principles

• Understand trauma: It can result from abuse, neglect, violence, loss, or oppression.
• It affects physical/mental health, behavior, and relationships.
• Ensure safety: Prioritize physical, emotional, and psychological safety.
• Create a secure environment.
• Ensure trust and transparency: Build trust through consistent, open, and honest communication.
• Making policies and practices clear and predictable.
• Choice and empowerment: Provide choices and involve individuals in decision-making.
• Empower clients to regain a sense of control.
• Promote collaboration by fostering partnerships and teamwork.
• Cultural humility: Respect and integrate different identities into care.
• Recognize strengths and resilience rather than focusing on deficits.
• Helps the client build life skills, and confidence to navigate trauma.
• Preventing Re-traumatization: Avoid triggers and be sensitive to responses.

HCA's role when providing Trauma-Informed Care

• Trauma Awareness: understand individual's reaction to certain experiences, and how trauma has shaped them.
• Emphasize create a physical and emotional safety, using clear communication, respect and promote boundaries.
• Promote Choice, and Connection: Empower clients by involving them in decision-making process, and showing empathy.
• Use Strength-Based, and Skill-Building Approach: Focus on client's strength, teaching life skills and building confidence.
• Self-Care and Professional Support: Knowing when a client needs secondary support, such as therapy, and having the resources to do so.

Caregiver Characteristics

• Valuable personal and professional caregiver characteristics must be taken into account when working with patients. Considerations:
• Personality/temperament
• Knowledge about mental health
• Ability to form relationships with clients
• Need for control
• Ability to work with other health care team members
• Ability to interact with family members

BC 211

• Exploration of community resources in British Columbia using the BC 211 website helps build knowledge and preparedness as a future Health Care Assistant (HCA).
• Students will be asked to do an activity involving this resource.
• Visiting the given website to find resources.
• Selecting three based on interest and what benefits an HCA might derive from knowing about them.
• Document key information: why the organization was chosen, who it aids, what it does, how it helps, and it's regional location and availablity.