CRITICAL THINKING CHALLENGES

1. Examine how family and friends describe people with mental illness. Do you think their
description of mental illness is based on fact or myth? Explain.

Mental illness, according to friends and family during the early eras, are believed
to be possessions of demons and the individual with mental illness because of stigma.
They deny the person because of shame and disgrace they receive from the rest of the
society. It is definitely a myth because at present times, we all know the fact behind
mental illness and the description of family and friends in present time is a lot different
from the past.

2. Compare the ideas of Psychiatric care during the 1800s with those of the 1900s and
2000s and identify the major political and economic forces that influenced care.

During the 1800s, as mental illness began to be viewed as an illness, more humane
and moral treatments began to develop. As psychiatric-mental health nursing continued
to develop as a profession in the early part of the 1900s, modern perspectives on mental
illness were emerging in research, and these new theories would profoundly shape the
future of mental health care for all practitioners. In 2001, the World Health Organization
focused its annual World Health Report on mental health, emphasizing the importance of
mental health to the well being of individuals.

3. Analyze the social, political and economic changes that influenced the community
mental health movement.

The Commission recommended that planning and implementation of the system

'Action for Mental Health' would include the consumers to and that funding for the
contraction and operation of the community mental health system. It was presented at a
time that was politically ripe for the new ideas. The ideas from John Kennedy expressed
in the report clearly shifted authority for ment5al health programming to the federal
government. The predominant view was that many of the problems of mental disorders
were caused by the deplorable conditions of the state mental institutions and that ,if
patients were moved into a 'normal' community-living setting, the symptoms of mental
disorders could easily treated and eventually disappear.
4. Present an argument for the moral treatment of people with mental disorder.

In the early 1900s, two opposing views were held regarding mental illness: the
belief that mental disorders had biologic origins and the belief that the problems were
attributed to environmental and social stresses. The psychosocial theory proposed that
mental disorders resulted from environmental and social deprivation. Moral management
(nonrestraint, kindness, and hygiene) in an asylum was the answer. The biologic view
held that mental illnesses had a biologic cause and could be treated with physical
interventions.

5. Trace the history of biologic psychiatry and highlight major ideas and treatments

In the early 1900s, biologic science was not far enough advanced to offer
reasonable treatment approaches, and existing primitive physical treatments, such as
venesections (bloodletting) and gyrations (strapping patients to a rotating board), were
either painful or considered barbaric. Until the 1940s, the biologic understanding of
mental illness was fairly unsophisticated and often misguided. Biologic treatments during
this century often were unsuccessful because of the lack of understanding and knowledge
of the biologic basis of mental disorders. Thanks to modern technology, neurosurgical
techniques and electroconvulsive therapy can be humanely applied with positive
therapeutic outcomes for some psychiatric disorder.

.Ancheta, Annabelle V
BSN 3Y3 – 9

Ms.Apol Alejandro
Psychiatric Nursing