The Potential Impact of Adjunct Digital Tools and Technology to Help Distressed and Suicidal Men: An Integrative Review

Suicidal men feel the need to be self-reliant and that they cannot find another way out of relationship or socioeconomic issues. Suicide prevention is of crucial importance worldwide. The much higher rate of suicide in men engenders action. The prelude is a subjective experience that can be very isolating and severely distressing. Men may not realize a change in their thinking and behaviors, which makes it more difficult to seek and get help, thereby interrupting a “downward spiral”. Stoicism often prevents men from admitting to their personal struggle. The lack of “quality” connections and “non-tailored” therapies has led to a high number of men “walking out” on traditional clinical approaches. But there are complicated relationships in motivations and formative behaviors of suicide with regards to emotional state, psychiatric disorders, interpersonal life events and suicidal behavior method selection. Middle-aged and older men have alternated as the most at-risk of suicide. There is no one solution that applies to all men, but digital tools may be of assistance (e.g., video conferences, social networks, telephone calls, and emails). Digital interventions require higher levels of effectiveness for distress and suicidality but self-guided approaches may be the most suitable for men especially where linked with an integrated online suicide prevention platform (e.g., quick response with online chats, phone calls, and emails). Furthermore, technology-enabled models of care offer promise to advance appropriate linking to mental health services through better and faster understanding of the specific needs of individuals (e.g., socio-cultural) and the type and level of suicidality experienced. Long-term evidence for suicidality and its evaluation may benefit from progressing human computer-interaction and providing impetus for an eminent integrated digital platform.

Community Reintegration of Long-Term Psychiatric Patients Through a Creative Arts Rehabilitation Therapy Group

After years of inpatient treatment in a locked facility, psychiatric patients who are preparing to transition to lower-security residential settings often benefit from bridging that continuum of care with supervised community excursions. In this study, facilitators and patients collaborated to identify and engage in a variety of arts-related experiences and settings in nearby cities and nature areas as a medium through which to help reconnect patients in a state psychiatric hospital with their surrounding community. Preliminary findings from data gathered included increased positive affect and quality of life, decreased feelings of isolation and institutionalization, more positive regard for treatment, and maintained or improved pace of patient progress toward discharge and community reintegration. Supervised therapeutic exposure to arts in the community appears to be an indicated clinical option to help motivate and prepare select psychiatric inpatients for community reintegration. As this is an information-sharing article regarding research-informed practice rather than the result of a research project, formal research is recommended as a next step to establish external validity and further the field’s knowledge of this topic.

The role of Mental Health Care Act status in dignity-related complaints by psychiatric inpatients: A cross-sectional analytical study

Background: Globally interest has grown in promoting the rights of patients, especially psychiatric patients. Two core elements of patients’ rights are the rights to be treated in a dignified manner and to give feedback about services. Psychiatric patients may feel treated in an undignified manner, especially during involuntary hospital admissions.Aim: We explored the relationship between Mental Health Care Act 17 of 2002 (MHCA) status and dignity-related complaints.Setting: The study was conducted at a specialist state psychiatric hospital.Methods: We reviewed 120 registered complaints by psychiatric inpatients, retrieved the clinical files, and analysed 70 complaints. Fisher’s exact tests described the relationship between patients’ MHCA status and the frequency of dignity-related or other categories of complaints. Logistic regression analyses were adjusted for potential covariates.Results: Most complaints were from single, literate male patients, aged 30–39 years, with mood disorders. Most complainants were admitted involuntarily (60%). Dignity-related complaints (n = 41; 58%) outnumbered nondignity-related complaints (n = 29; 41%). The proportion of dignity-related complaints was higher in involuntary (64%) and assisted (60%) patients than in voluntary patients (44%). Dignity-related complaints were not significantly associated with MHCA status (χ2 = 2.03 and p = 0.36). Involuntary patients were more than twice as likely as assisted and voluntary patients to complain about dignity-related matters (Odds ratio [OR]: 2.25; 95% confidence interval [CI] [0.71; 7.13]; p = 0.16).Conclusion: Involuntary patients are more likely to complain about dignity-related matters. Qualitative research is recommended for a deeper understanding of patients’ experiences during admission.

Providing Restricted Access to Mental Health Archives within Government Archives: The Subject Stakeholder

ABSTRACT Since 2010, the author has been part of the Central State Hospital (CSH) Digital Library and Archives Project to digitize records from the first state psychiatric hospital for African Americans, founded in 1870 in Virginia at the pleadings of the Freedman's Bureau and run by the state since then.1 Many of the records of this hospital not yet accessioned by the Library of Virginia have now been digitized, and this project is working on a set of tools for lawful access, including one that can be used for automated redaction to protect sensitive data while responding to the needs of different stakeholder groups. Project participants were especially concerned about understanding the communities that have grown up around state-run psychiatric hospitals, as the project was done at the request of the hospital. The proposed plan is to work with the Central State Hospital and the Library of Virginia to provide the project materials to both. The records that were chosen to be digitized included the minutes of the people who first ran the hospital as well as the registers kept on the patients, which differ over time.2 In the past ten to fifteen years, professional discussion about community archives has responded to communities' desires to build their own archives so that they can be treated fairly, especially with reference to records created about them and kept by others, including records found in state archives.