CONSUMER PARTICIPATION IN THE MENTAL HEALTH FIELD.
Item
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Title
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CONSUMER PARTICIPATION IN THE MENTAL HEALTH FIELD.
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Identifier
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AAI8601639
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identifier
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8601639
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Creator
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FOSS, EARL MICHAEL.
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Contributor
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Michael Smith
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Date
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1985
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Language
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English
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Publisher
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City University of New York.
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Subject
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Social Work
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Abstract
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In many areas of the mental health field, consumer participation was mandated by Federal legislation in the form of establishing consumer advisory boards to the mental health facility.;Several authors have noted the need for formalized training of these boards to enable them to become more effective and to ensure social accountability of the mental health facility. They note the need for formalized training in such areas as the budget and budgetary processes, the organizational structure of the facility, group processes of the advisory board, program evaluation, and patient rights.;The board training in this project was administered to a targeted population, an advisory board to a community mental health center. The training content was formulated by a review of the literature on this topic, by a review of the board's past minutes, by discussion with the administration of the facility and by discussion with the board members as to their areas of concern and interest.;The infrequency of board meetings, the range of educational backgrounds of its members, conflicts between the power needs of the administration and the board, the ambiguous role of the board, and their lack of representativeness of their community constitute limitations for training. In spite of these limitations the board initiated more significant activities, the administration became more responsive to the board's requests and specific ideas to affect the organization were implemented by the board following training.;For these consumer advisory boards to fulfill their mandate, changes are necessary. At the federal level, the guidelines for citizen participation cannot be generic. Real power must be given to these boards to achieve representative advisory boards. The schools which train professionals in the mental health field need to institute courses in the values of citizen participation and train students to recognize the potential benefits of such participation. These advisory boards also need to possess meaningful channels of communication with the organization it is to advise. Finally, board training needs to be conducted as a sequential learning process, not a series of independent sessions. A manual is provided in the appendix for training consumer advisory board members to a mental health facility. (Abstract shortened with permission of author.).
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Type
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dissertation
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Source
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PQT Legacy CUNY.xlsx
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degree
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D.S.W.
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Program
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Social Welfare
