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You can send
us news items or your views on local mental health
services and we will post them on this page either as
they are or an edited version. We will not be able to
post everything we receive but our news and views editorial
group will select the items we feel are suitable for
us. We will be monitoring and updating the news and
views page at the beginning of each month, we have selected
the 25th of the month as the deadline for any item which
you would like to appear in the following month.
Here is a list of categories
under which we will be posting news.
- Local news about new mental health
services or projects
- National news about mental health
issues
- News about Islington Mind services
and activities
- Your views about local or national
mental health policy initiatives
We will also be running local
polls about issues that affect us all. The current poll
is related to the proposed ban on smoking in psychiatric
wards. Although these polls aren't scientific, they
will give us an indication of the way that people are
feeling and we will be able to use the information from
them when we are meeting with local commissioners or
other decision-making bodies.
Latest News
Ten ways to look after your mental health in
2008
The Mental Health
Foundation has ten suggestions to improve your mental
wellbeing during the new year. Click here
for the list, complete with useful links.
Charity trustees needed for
Hearing Voices Network
The National Hearing Voices Network (HVN) is a registered
charity working with voice hearers. It is seeking trustees
and would love to hear from people with experience of
voice-hearing or individuals involved in the mental
health field. If you would like to learn more about
HVN or becoming a trustee, please email
Bronwen.
National
News
Debt
problems highlighted
The debt charity Christians
Against Poverty has found "strong evidence
that families and couples across the UK are being pushed
to breaking point and beyond, with many not eating properly,
taking medication and splitting up as they can no longer
cope" because of debt problems, according to Matt
Barlow, the charity's UK chief executive.
More than
a quarter of the 288 clients surveyed said their relationships
had broken down because of money problems. More than
half said that money problems had put a strain on their
relationship, and two thirds said they had missed meals
to make debt repayments. Twenty-two per cent said they
did this regularly.
Almost seventy
per cent of those seeking help with their debts had
seen their doctor about stress, and forty per cent were
on medication.
The debt management
group Chiltern,
which sets up informal debt management plans in co-operation
with debtors and their creditors, said that the average
amount owed by someone taking out one of its plans had
fallen below £26,000 for the first time since
it began collecting figures last August. Chiltern said
the reduction may indicate that people are dealing with
their debt problems sooner, but that the credit crunch
and rising living costs are also putting people's incomes
under more pressure.
Source: Mental
Health Foundation
Survey
on self-harm among young people
More than
a fifth of young people between the ages of eleven and
nineteen say they have engaged in self-harm, according
to research by Affinity,
which provides mental health services to the NHS. The
problem was worst among girls, a third of whom said
they had harmed themselves.
Dr David Kingsley, who led the study, said on the Today
programme: "Some self-harm isn't suicidal in intent,
but is rather a way in which young people seek relief
from emotional pain.
"Certainly, for very severe self-harm, things like
physical and sexual abuse can be a factor, but in less
serious self-harm, the top issue seems to be family
relationship difficulties.
"Other things are relationships with friends and
pressures at school."
Source: Mental
Health Foundation
C4
film a "major challenge" to coventional approach
to voices
The international
charity for people who hear voices, Intervoice,
has praised the Channel Four documentary film The
Doctor Who Hears Voices.
The film reconstructs the therapy given by the psychologist
and Intervoice member Dr Rufus May to a junior doctor
who was suspended from her job after hearing voices
telling her to commit suicide.
Intervoice says that two-thirds of those who hear voices
are not mentally ill and do not need psychiatric care.
They said that the film challenged the common assumption
that hearing voices is directly associated with schizophrenia.
May himself was diagnosed as schizophrenic when he was
eighteen. Against his doctor's advice, he came off medication
and trained as a clinical psychologist. He has been
nominated for the 2008
Mind Champion of the Year award for his efforts
to improve public understanding of mental health issues.
The president of Intervoice, Professor Marius Romme,
said: "Rufus is only one committed expert by profession,
imagine if whole services worked in the same way? This
approach is not controversial or dangerous, it is based
on over 20 years of research and action and now with
initiatives in 19 countries across the world. It represents
a major challenge to the approach used by psychiatric
services."
Source: Mental
Health Foundation
Workers
hide depression from colleagues
A survey funded
by the pharmaceutical firm Servier Laboratories, and
released to coincide with Depression Awareness Week,
shows that seventy-nine per cent of working people who
suffer from depression believe that revealing their
condition to colleagues could be detrimental to their
working life.
Thirty-two per cent of those who disclosed their condition
say that they have been turned down for a job as a result.
It is thought that about one in ten people of working
age in the UK suffers depression, but only a quarter
of these have informed their personnel departments.
Just over half of those who have dislcosed their condition
believe they are discouraged from taking on exciting
projects, and just under half say they are avoided by
colleagues and/or have received snide comments.
Forty-six per cent of the 288 people surveyed said that
having a job helped them feel they were on the road
to recovery. The chief executive of the Depression
Alliance, Emer O'Neill, said: "Having a job
is very important to people with depression so employers
and colleagues need to have a much greater understanding
of the challenges faced by people with depression in
order to provide the support they need to contribute
fully."
Three-quarters of those surveyed found the most distressing
aspect of their depression to be the lowness of their
energy levels. The most desired measures to help sufferers
were flexitime, cover for time off and counselling.
Source: Mental
Health Foundation |
