Mental Illness Sociology

During the 1700’s the jails were not only used to confine criminals, but they confined people with mental illness as well. People with mental illness were subjected to inhumane treatment, even when the individual was admitted

Institutional care was condemned, as in many cases patients’ mental conditions deteriorated, and institutions were not able to treat the individual in a holistic manner. In many state institutions, patients numerously outnumbered the poorly trained staff. Many patients were boarded in these facilities for extensive periods of time without receiving any services. By 1963, the average stay for an individual with a diagnosis of schizophrenia was eleven years. As the media and newspapers publicized the inhumane conditions that existed in many psychiatric hospitals, awareness grew and there was much public pressure to create improved treatment options (Young Minds Advocacy, 2016). .

Many years ago, mental illness was viewed as a demonic possession or a religious punishment. In the 18th century, the attitudes towards mental illness were negative and persistent. This negativity leads to the stigmatization and confinement of those who were mentally ill. The mentally ill were sent to mental hospitals that were unhealthy and dangerous. A push in the mid 1950s for deinstitutionalization began because of activists lobbying for change. Dorothea Dix was one of these activists that helped push for change. The change called for more community oriented care rather than asylum based care. The Community Mental Health Centers Act of 1963 closed state psychiatric hospitals throughout the United States. "Only individuals who posed an imminent danger to themselves or someone else could be committed to state psychiatric hospitals" (A Brief History of Mental Illness and the U.S. Mental Health Care System). Deinstitutionalization meant to improve quality of life and treatment for those who are mentally ill. This would hopefully result in the mentally ill receiving treatment so they could live more independently. The hope was that community mental health programs would provide this treatment but sadly there was not sufficient or ongoing funding to meet the growing demand for these programs. Budgets for mental hospitals were reduced but there was no increase for the community based programs. Many mentally ill individuals have been moved to nursing homes or other residential

Overall, Conditions in asylums today are drastically different than asylums in the 1800s due to the better understanding of mental illnesses. As time goes on and technology advances, society will continue to advance in it’s knowledge of mental

The theory of ‘deinstitutionalization’ began arising with the theory of providing more freedom to the mentally ill and less spending on full time care facilities. The widespread use of drugs to control the mentally ill in the 1900s led to a mass release of patients and an emptying of asylums. Outpatient Psychiatric Clinics were established. Case Law in the United States began to be generated to provide the mentally ill with greater rights. Shelton v. Tucker 1960 provided that the mentally ill should receive care in the “least restrictive alternative”, which is a practice still utilized. O’Connor v. Donaldson 1975 ruled that non-dangerous mental patients have the right to be treated or discharged if they have been institutionalized against their will. This new approached permitted the mass exodus

The United States has never had an official federal-centered approach for mental health care facilities, entrusting its responsibility to the states throughout the history. The earliest initiatives in this field took place in the 18th century, when Virginia built its first asylum and Pennsylvania Hospital reserved its basement to house individuals with mental disorders (Sundararaman, 2009). During the 19th century, other services were built, but their overall lack of quality was alarming. Even then, researchers and professionals in the mental health field attempted to implement the principles of the so-called public health, focusing on prevention and early intervention, but the funds were in the hands of the local governments, which prevented significant advances in this direction.

Although the 19th century expansion of asylums in Europe and The United States was a movement initially based on moral principles, it led to significant negative implications for individuals, who were institutionalized as asylums became overcrowded, lacking hygiene, neglectful of patients and an overall place for poor living conditions (Wright, 1997). The rise in in-patient population in the early 19th century and patients’ inabilities to reintegrate into the community as a result of institutionalization have often been explained in terms of the mental health system and developments in psychology at the time. Sociologists on the other hand, have argued that these institutions have caused people to remain institutionalized. A compelling

The mentally ill were cared for at home by their families until the state recognized that it was a problem that was not going to go away. In response, the state built asylums. These asylums were horrendous; people were chained in basements and treated with cruelty. Though it was the asylums that were to blame for the inhumane treatment of the patients, it was perceived that the mentally ill were untamed crazy beasts that needed to be isolated and dealt with accordingly. In the opinion of the average citizen, the mentally ill only had themselves to blame (Surgeon General’s Report on Mental Health, 1999). Unfortunately, that view has haunted society and left a lasting impression on the minds of Americans. In the era of "moral treatment", that view was repetitively attempted to be altered. Asylums became "mental hospitals" in hope of driving away the stigma yet nothing really changed. They still were built for the untreatable chronic patients and due to the extensive stay and seemingly failed treatments of many of the patients, the rest of the society believed that once you went away, you were gone for good. Then the era of "mental hygiene" began late in the nineteenth century. This combined new concepts of public health, scientific medicine, and social awareness. Yet despite these advancements, another change had to be made. The era was called "community mental health" and

One of the earliest reforms occurred at an asylum in Devon, England. This facility had employed opium, leeches, and purges as cures for mental illness, but in the mid-1800s emphasized non-restraint methods to affect patients’ health (Stigma 64).

The evolution of mental health care put forth in the book has been one plagued with torture and inhuman practices. During the eighteenth century, mentally ill patients were confined to what can only be described as dungeons. “The lunatics” were housed in “unheated, dingy cells in the basement, where they had often slept on straw,” and placed in chains (3). Under such condition patients mad little to no progress, and were simply tucked away from the rest of society. However, in the early nineteenth century, physician Benjamin Rush of the Pennsylvania Hospital, created a “mad ward,” where patients were moved to humane living condition and received medical treatment (3). Rush recognized the early work of the Quakers, who rationalized the mental

Overcrowding was a huge issue in the insane asylums. In 1900 based on the authority of the Lunacy Commissioners report, it was stated that there was one “registered lunatic per every three hundred people.” (Chapman 164). Danvers State Hospital was built in 1878 to house 500 patients. This institution had over 2300 patients at its peak in the 1940s (Taylor). The over population of insane asylums began to deteriorate them and make them some of the most horrible places that existed. The conditions in these institutions were barely livable. The workers were also mean to the patients and did many awful things to them. There were too many patients and not enough nurses and doctors. This made the nurses work harder and put a lot more stress on them (“Pennhurst State”). In the 1950s, the Trans Allegheny Lunatic Asylum was occupied by over 2500 people. However, it was built to occupy only 250 people. The conditions were so filthy that occupants began to get sick and die. Some people were euthanized during this time

Asylums around the United States of America have dealt with many kind of people with different kinds of illness. There was a cut down on the help that asylums were getting and were closed down for good. In some parts of the United States police have had to dealt with the mentally ill people on the street because of the closed down asylums. People that are mentally ill end up in prison for minor crimes, but stay there for the help they can't get outside of prison.

Unfortunately, asylum founders could only guess at the causes of insanity. Patient after patient was admitted into the state hospitals, but the cause of their disturbance was often a mystery. Many were inflicted with various organic diseases, like dementia, Huntington’s disease, brain tumors, and many were in the third stage of syphilis. With no treatments available, providing humane care was all that could be done. In the years following the civil war American cities boomed and the asylum began struggling to keep up. Soldiers, freed slaves, and immigrants were stranded in a strange land. The asylum became organized more like a factory or small town. There were upper and lower classman, bosses and workers, patients with nothing, and patients with privileges. Sarah Burrows, a schizophrenic and daughter of a wealthy doctor had a ten bedroom house that was built for her on the hospital grounds. Burrows home was just a stone’s throw away from the hospital’s west wing, where over sixty black women slept side by side. (Asylum: A History of the Mental Institution in America). The hospital began to rely on the free labor the patients provided. However, isolating the hospital from the community meant there was no way of knowing what was happening inside the asylum. The asylum became a world apart. In the 1870’s, Elizabeth Packard, a former patient of St. Elizabeth’s, wrote about her mistreatment and abuse

Over time, the facilities deteriorated and focused on keeping the mentally ill locked away from the rest of society rather than helping them get better. An example of this is one of the first hospitals made in 1773, in Williamsburg, Virginia. Many would think the doctors in these facilities would genuinely care about their patients, but most did not. They actually wanted to condition the patients to be afraid of them. In hopes that the fear would put them into place and cure their illnesses. Most doctors actually had no idea on how to treat patients and would often perform treatments based on their own theories on what causes mental illness. The patients were practically human experiments, which many didn’t agree to be but were

Mental Disorders date back to the beginning of mankind, but mental institutions and treatments for these disorders do not. In the beginning people believed that a mental disorder meant a person was being possessed or was the work of witchcraft. This brought along a social stigma to the disorder as people did not want to associate themselves with those things. In turn, the mentally disabled people were sent to prisons, poorhouses, abandoned or left at their own houses. People before the Victorian Era did not care about mentally disabled people, they put them in the back of their minds and continued on with their lives. Going into the Victorian Era the image of the institution started to change, people started to change their minds and the government did as well. In 1841 England they passed a law that required institutions to have a higher level of standards than they did before. During the Victorian Era people realized that it was actually a serious medical problem and something that a person needs treatment for. When the mental institutions first started they were basically prisons that really only separated the insane from regular citizens. Nevertheless it was a step up from being cast away from society like the insane had been. Even with the reforms and the better looking future for the mental institutions, they were still horrific places where the food was on the brink of edible and the living quarters were crowded and filthy. The nurses and doctors would often mentally