More people are struggling emotionally and with this in mind here are some big challenges facing mental health facilities.
Research has indicated that in the United States of America alone, about twenty percent of the adult population or one in five Americans suffer from a mental health condition in a given year.
In fact, one in every twenty-five adults suffers from a critical mental health problem that affects their quality of life.
This shows that mental health care should be prioritized for improvement – not only in the United States – but across the globe.
Governments should make sure that they have trained enough professionals. Plus they should allocate enough money to develop this sector of the healthcare system.
However, this is not the case in most countries. Today, countries face a lot of challenges when it comes to setting up mental health facilities and offering services to mental health patients.
As you might know, I am a bestselling wellness author with about 2 million books sold globally. I founded a groundbreaking video course called The Anxiety Cure.
I love sharing insights and strategies to help people to live their best life.
With this in mind I put together this quick guide about some of the big challenges facing mental health facilities.
Mental health facilities need the financial muscle to hire the right professionals and meet their operational costs. However, most of them cannot afford this. As a result, it’s impossible for them to meet the rising demand for mental health treatment.
In addition, most people do not receive the care that they need due to financial difficulties. Many people even forgo treatment due to the cost of mental healthcare and lack of insurance coverage.
However, facilities can use technology to cut down operational and treatment costs. The COVID-19 pandemic, for instance, has increased the demand for mental health support. With this in mind, facilities must be more efficient in their services – while cutting costs.
Technology has provided mental health software and other applications that make treatment affordable through things such as virtual care. As a result, organizations can have a single professional attending to multiple patients at the same time.
Mental health facilities are faced with long waiting times when offering services to their patients. As the patients keep on waiting, their physical and mental health gets worse and they get less interested in getting the treatment.
For instance, a recent study in Ontario has indicated that children are the worst hit with long waiting times. It found that in some areas, children are forced to wait for more than two years before they can receive treatment for mental health problems.
On the other hand, adults are seen by mental health professionals depending on urgency or priority based on their mental health conditions. That notwithstanding, the same study found that patients suffering from things such as mood disorders and psychoses can wait for more than two weeks.
This challenge can also be mitigated through technology. Mental health technology is actually transforming healthcare at large. With technology, the waiting time of patients can be reduced through the use of video conferencing and other applications that speed up service delivery.
When it comes to mental health treatment, accessibility might have different meanings to different people. For instance, there might be enough mental health facilities in a certain region but minimal budgets might mean that they do not have enough resources to bring patients from their homes.
This means that less mobile and older patients without family or even friends might find it difficult to access mental health facilities.
On the other hand, in most low-income communities, there are inadequate mental health facilities as well as professionals. Meaning? People in those communities do not have access to mental health treatment.
Other factors contributing to lack of accessibility include:
Finally, mental health facilities do not have enough support to aid the treatment of their patients.
Even though there has been an increase in awareness about mental health treatment, some people are still afraid of admitting that they have a mental health problem. As a result, they fail to get treatment.
Others, when getting the treatment, do it secretly with the fear of the stigma associated with mental health. For instance, famous people and some celebrities do not want the world to know that they have mental health conditions.
They, therefore, check themselves into mental health facilities under tight security and secretly. If they did not do this, they would be creating mental health awareness and making it known to the world that it is okay to get treatment for mental health conditions.
The mental health topic is becoming more popular in recent years. More people struggle with mental health conditions than ever before. This means that governments, as well as non-governmental organizations, should do everything that they can to support mental health facilities.
On the other hand, people should fight the stigma associated with mental health. They should accept it as a condition that can be treated.
Think about subscribing for free weekly tools here.
No SPAM, ever! Read the Privacy Policy for more information.
