{"id":2669,"date":"2023-07-03T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-03T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/?p=2669"},"modified":"2024-07-14T05:38:11","modified_gmt":"2024-07-14T10:38:11","slug":"white-paper-on-improving-psychiatric-patient-outcomes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/2023\/07\/03\/white-paper-on-improving-psychiatric-patient-outcomes\/","title":{"rendered":"White Paper on Improving Psychiatric Patient Outcomes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Reference:
WHITE PAPER<\/a> on Improving Patient Outcomes, Addressing Treatment Caused Trauma & Injuries, Enhancing Patient Rights, and Grievance Procedures for the Report Required by \u00a7 36 of CH 41 SLA 2022 (HB172<\/a>)<\/em>
by James B. (Jim) Gottstein, Esq.; Faith Myers; Susan Musante, LPCC; David Cohen, PhD; Peter C. G\u00f8tzsche, MD; David Healy, MD; The International Society for Ethical Psychology & Psychiatry<\/a>
April 2023, Addenda May 2023
Anchorage, Alaska<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[Note: Full references and citations are provided in the original White Paper.<\/a>]<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On July 15, 2022, Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy signed HB172 into law which requires the Department of Health, Department of Family and Community Services, and the Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority to report on, among other things, improving psychiatric patient outcomes, institutional trauma, enhancing patient rights, the grievance process, and patient injuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Legislation was enacted to comply with a settlement over a successful lawsuit brought against the State of Alaska for illegally confining people for extended periods of time in correctional facilities and emergency rooms awaiting admission to the Alaska Psychiatric Institute for court ordered psychiatric evaluations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This White Paper provides input for the required Report to the Legislature, focusing on improving patient outcomes, enhancing patient rights, having an effective and legitimate grievance process, and addressing patient injuries and treatment-caused trauma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Executive Summary of the White Paper<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If the fundamental purpose of the mental health system is to improve the lives of psychiatric patients it is failing miserably. That the State does not keep track of institutional trauma and patient complaints, and has no legitimate grievance process are illustrations of the lack of commitment to improving patients\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mental health system\u2019s standard treatments are counterproductive and harmful, and often forced on unwilling patients. The overreliance on psychiatric drugs is reducing the recovery rate of people diagnosed with serious mental illness and reducing their life spans. Psychiatric incarceration, euphemistically called \u201cinvoluntary commitment<\/a>,\u201d is similarly counterproductive and harmful, adding to patients\u2019 trauma and massively associated with suicides. Harmful psychiatric interventions are being imposed on people by judges in proceedings where the facts about treatments and their harms are not being presented by appointed counsel, rendering the proceedings shams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Court proceedings to psychiatrically incarcerate people on the grounds it is necessary to protect other people from harm should be eliminated; predictions of violence are not accurate and no one else besides someone who receives a psychiatric diagnosis is incarcerated for something they might do in the future. Court proceedings to psychiatrically drug people against their will on the grounds it is in their best interest should be eliminated. They are not in people\u2019s best interest if unwanted. \u201cIf it is not voluntary it is not treatment.\u201d If such proceedings are nonetheless held, they should be conducted in a legitimate manner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The most important elements for improving patients\u2019 lives are People, Place and Purpose. People\u2014even psychiatric patients\u2014need to have a safe place to live (Place), relationships (People), and to have activity that is meaningful to them, usually school or work (Purpose). People need to be given hope these are possible. Voluntary approaches that improve people\u2019s lives should be made available instead of the currently prevailing counterproductive and harmful psychiatric drugs for everyone, forever regime often forced on people. The White Paper lists at least 8 successful non-drug treatment programs that already exist for people experiencing mental distress. Brutal incarceration and coercive psychiatry is not the only option.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By implementing these approaches, Alaska\u2019s mental health system can improve the recovery rate. As bad as it is for adults, the psychiatric incarceration and psychiatric drugging of children and youth is even more tragic and should be stopped. Instead, children and youth should be helped to manage their emotions and become successful, and their parents should be given support and assistance to achieve this.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Psychiatric incarceration and psychiatric drugging of children is tragic and should be stopped. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Psychiatric incarceration and psychiatric drugging of children is tragic and should be stopped.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[29,200,34,25,154,56,64,46,77],"class_list":["post-2669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-big-muddy-river-newsletter","tag-abuse","tag-alaska","tag-alternatives","tag-child-drugging","tag-coercive-psychiatry","tag-courts","tag-involuntary-commitment","tag-mental-health","tag-psychiatric-drugs"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6NMpC-H3","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2669"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2669\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cchrstl.org\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}