Mental Health Disorders: A Case Study

Cassie presents with multidimensional and complex problems. The problems are inter related and need to be addressed concurrently. This client presents with a history of anxiety and childhood sexual abuse which manifests as post traumatic stress disorder [PTSD], social phobia (social anxiety disorder) and depression. Wagner (2008) reports a strong association between social anxiety disorder and depression. Post traumatic stress disorder [PTSD] in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DMS-5; American Psychiatric Association [APA], 2013) specifically includes sexual violation as one of the diagnostic criteria for PTSD. Consequentially, co-morbid symptoms create dis-regulated behaviours which may have long

Another major factor is the lack of medical services in the prisons and jails. Many of the mentally ill are retained in the criminal justice system without the appropriate treatment needed because of the lack of trained staff in the mental illness field (Markowitz, 2011). There is usually limited access to treatment programs while incarcerated and a high risk of decomposition and deterioration (Rock, 2001). In a Frontline documentary on mental illness researchers estimated that about two thirds of the inmates in state facilities who did receive counseling or psychotropic drugs did not necessarily specialize in providing mental health services; leaving us to believe when the adequate treatment is being distributed is it being properly

With states closing many of its mental facilities in the communities, there were a lot of people in need of outpatient care who fell through the cracks of the system and ended up in prison. Prison is where many of them died from inadequate treatment. Prisons were suddenly receiving inmates with the following types of mental illnesses: Schizophrenia, bipolar, and deep depressions. These prisons just did not provide these inmates with any medication during their incarceration. Because the community based health services is lacking, and patients aren’t receiving sufficient outpatient care, it makes the effectiveness of deinstitutionalization a serious problem. Without the availability of 24/7 psychiatric services that are well structured, I believe that deinstitutionalization is what is accounting for the increase of the mentally ill inmates in the correctional facility.

The number of people with mental illness in the criminal justice system is one of the most pressing problems facing law enforcement and corrections today (Cuellar, McReynolds, & Wasserman, 2006). The Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health estimated that about 20% of children and adolescents in the general population have mental disorders with some degree of at least mild functional impairment (USPH, 1999). Subsequent research has found much higher rates of serious mental health problems among youth in the juvenile justice system. Among youth who have been arrested, one study found that 31% of youth had received services from the mental health system (Rosenblatt, Rosenblatt, & Biggs, 2000). Two studies of youth in juvenile detention found that between 60% and 68% met the diagnostic criteria for a mental health disorder (Teplin, Abram, McClelland, Dulcan, & Mericle, 2002; Wasserman, Ko, & McReynolds, 2004). Once youth with emotional disturbances enter the justice system, repeated arrests are common through the remainder of childhood and into adulthood. Recidivism rates for individuals with a serious mental illness are nearly double those in the general population (Baillargeon, Binswanger, Penn, Williams, & Murray, 2009; Constantine, Petrila, Andel, Givens, Becker et al., 2010). In an analysis of juvenile trajectories, youth with emotional disturbances in their late adolescent years were more likely to fall into the high arrest trajectory class and much

The need for the Jail Diversion Program arises from the increasing number of mental health problems among the jail population in the United States. According to Bell, Decker, & Sullivan (2013), 64 percent of the adults incarcerated in the US prisons in

The United States criminal justice system has been continuously increasing incarceration among individuals who suffer from a sever mental illness. As of 2007 individuals with severe mental illness were over twice as likely to be found in prisons than in society (National Commission of Correctional Health Care, 2002, as cited in Litschge &Vaughn, 2009). The offenses that lead to their commitment in a criminal facility, in the majority of cases, derive from symptoms of their mental illness instead of deviant behavior. Our criminal justice system is failing those who would benefit more from the care of a psychiatric rehabilitation facility or psychiatric hospital by placing them in correctional facilities or prisons.

Mental health courts are a resource given to prisoners who would normally be put in prison if they had not decided to join this special program. Mental health court is a court run program by the district attorney’s office in some counties. This program is based off of traditional court room structure but is also paired with community services. Mental health courts solve a lot of different problems within our criminal justice system. The first problem it solves is the

To conduct substantial study researchers chose an area with high number of individuals with serious mental illness (SMI) within the general and criminal justice population. The Criminal Mental Health Project (CMHP) established by the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida was a good setting in that four diversion programs were already in place. To analyze the effectiveness of the Short-Term Assessment of Risk and Treatability (START) risk assessment, researchers decided to focus on post-booking, pre-trial misdemeanor and felony diversion programs (Desmarais, Van Dorn, Telford, Petrila, & Coffey, 2012). Participating staff were to attend a one-day training workshop. The workshop was designed to evaluate professional judgement when evaluating violence risk and included actual and fictional case reviews to ensure adequate coding and interrater agreement. The assessment itself was created in a way to determine predisposition of self-harm, risk to others, self-neglect, suicide, being victimized, among other factors. Each factor was assessed in an ordinal scale for strength and vulnerability from minimally to maximally present. Total scores of the items indicated clients of jail diversion programs generally present more vulnerabilities than strengths. With exception of general offending and substance abuse, ratings of risk across the eight domains were

This research paper discusses the issues of people who suffer from mental illness being placed in jails instead of receiving the necessary treatment they need. The number of inmates serving time in jail or prison who suffer from mental illness continues to rise. In 2015 the Bureau of Justice reported that sixty five percent of state prisoners and fourth five percent of federal prisoners suffered from mental conditions such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Individuals who suffer from these problems require special mental health treatment for their needs to be met. Many of our prisons and jails lack the necessary resources to care for these inmates and because of that inmates who do not receive the treatment they need are at a higher risk of becoming a repeat offender. Despite the research and findings that show that the criminal justice system is unable to deal with issues dealing with the mentally ill there has been limited solutions put in place. Given the challenges the criminal justice system faces it is important to address the problem and come up with better solutions. This research paper will discuss the various techniques and solutions that scholars have propped and their effect on the issue of mentally ill criminals and how the criminal justice system should approach the problem.

Regardless of the severity of the accusation, courts make important consideration of the mental health of the client during the sentencing period. It involves non-custodian sanction, intensive support and supervision orders. Forensic Mental Health enhances access to services, improves the quality of care to the victims and facilitates transitions between systems (Springer, 2007). This initiative is achievable by the police departments that make formal and informal referral partnerships with the community health practitioners that issue details of the mental illness in different people. The correctional facilities enhance the transfer of the care of the citizens with severe mental illness and disturbances that cannot receive assistance from correctional institutions.

By providing mental health treatment in prisons, it will improve both the quality of life within the prison of the mentally ill along with the entire prison population. Treatment is also critical because it increases the probability of the mentally ill prisoners to better adjust to life once they are released and decrease the chance of reoffending and returning to prison (“Mental Health and Prisons”). There are a few objectives for the treatment goal. The first objective is to provide mentally ill prisoners access to proper mental health treatment and care that is at least at the minimum level of what is provided in the outside community. This mental health treatment can come about by providing mental health training to prison health workers, setting up times for community mental health teams to visit the prison, or allowing prisoners access to mental health services outside the prison (“Mental Health and Prison”).

Mental illness is an extreme epidemic within forensic and correctional settings. The prisoner population is estimated to have around 1,231,475 inmates incarcerated in state prisons and 135,246 in federal prison (Diamond et al., 2001, pg. 21). Some research statistics claim that around 20% of state prisoners and 21% of jail inmates have a history of mental illness (Vogel, Stephens, and Siebels, 2014). This number only grows when observing juvenile offenders, with an astounding 70% of youthful offenders dealing with at least one mental health condition and 20% having severe mental health problems (Vogel, Stephens, and Siebels, 2014). A 2013 article states that almost half of the nation’s prisoner population has some form of mental illness (Deslich

Undiagnosed individuals with serious mental disorders like schizophrenia or bipolar disorders are often sent into prisons without proper diagnosis or any plan for treatment or medications (Ford, M. 2015, June 8). As a matter of fact, prisons are becoming heavily populated with people, who are in desperate need of professional psychiatric care. Regrettably, there is an overwhelming population of America’s jails mentally ill that are booked for minor offenses. When someone is diagnosed with acute mental illness do not receive the proper care he or she needs, his or her actions automatically become indicative. Symptomatic severely mentally ill individual’s behavior appears criminal (Ford, M. 2015, June 8).

A National Survey of Mental Health Services Available to Offenders with Mental Illness: Who Is Doing What was a study conducted by Bewley and Morgan (2011). This is a study that shows prison inmates that are male with mental illness. There were participants from 165 state correctional facilities. They focused on six goals that were considered to be most important in the work. The six goals were mental illness recovery, emotions management, institutional functioning, re- entry, risk-need, and personal growth. Within the goals they provided services that were effective across 4 key treatments. The treatments were mental illness, skill development, behavioral functioning and criminogenic needs. Individual therapy was the most popular type of facilitations that was seen across the board. One example was stress and anger management, with 50 and 58 percent of the people choosing and liking the individual therapy. NAMI would be able to step in with lives of the prisoners. There could possibly be a higher percent for both therapies rather than just one (p. 351-363).

`In the past, I worked in such a research setting, where if a person was found to meet criteria for opiate dependence they received treatment, however if even slightly short of DSM-IV criteria for the disorder they would have to look elsewhere. This was a continual concern for me, as the person who met criteria was not always the person with the most distress, and alternative treatments were not easy for people to find. Largely from this experience, I find the current categorical approach to classifying persons with psychopathology to be an imperfect system at best, with the primary advantage of being convenience when communicating with other professionals. I question whether this convenience comes at a severe cost to accuracy, the