How realistic is it to expect health care workers to model mental, physical, and spiritual health?
Yes, health care professionals are human and share the same problems as the rest of the population. It can be a bit annoying to hear you have to lose weight or cut out fats from your diet from an obese doctor or nurse, but that's their job--teaching preventative health measures to avoid illness. And it's even more annoying to have a skinny person who has no idea what it's like to be overweight tell you this!
Why are some people who work in the mental health industry so fake and phony? Those are the kind of people who make it impossible for me to sneak help for anxiety and depression. My warped sense of humor is the only thing that helps me.
My guess is that the topic of ‘mental health’ is a very serious one. It means that a good worker should be prepared for unexpected behaviors and very direct expressions of feelings and thoughts by patients. However I too have witnessed many who put on a mask of false authority, rather than ‘be real’. They feel too vulnerable I guess. There is fear behind that phonyness. Fear of showing themselves as they really are and of meeting the patient as a PERSON, a human being just like they themselves are.I know that I would seek out the good ones, the ones that dared to be authentic and made the most of the help they offered and tried to just ignore the others, or just ‘use’ them in as far as they were useful for me without truly believing them or opening up to them. I don’t feel comfortable opening up to someone who is not willing to be open and frank with me, too. It does not mean the health care worker should tell me their problems, but I do need to feel that they are willing to be there, as a human being not as a ‘role’ or a ‘function’.If you can, do keep looking for workers that you feel you can trust and confide in.
As a patient or healthcare worker, have you ever experienced or witnessed violence in the ER? What happened?
I am a hospital chaplain and there certainly is violence in the ER. Keep in mind that it is the place where all of the following happen:People under the influence of drugs and or alcohol are brought in against their will by law enforcementPeople behaving in ways which cause the police to question mental stability are brought it to see if they are under the influence of drugs/alcohol or are mentally ill and in need of medical attention are brought inPeople who have gotten aggressive with the police and resisted arrest are brought in and are still not happy to be in a situation where they are being told what to do.These are the three biggest things that come to mind. When I am doing rounds and check in with the charge nurse, she will advise me of any cases like these and I will then decide whether or not it is worth approaching them. It is amazing how calm many of them are with a clergyman, almost as if they are afraid that I am an extension of God that can punish them personally more than the police and courts which often brought them in!To work with mental health patients and in the Emergency Room, I went through specific training on how to handle violent patients but it mostly involved how to defend myself and get away from a situation or recognize a situation before it escalated. Other training on talking someone down from an otherwise escalated state came from a combination of classroom training, experience and having God on my side when such situations have arisen.
What is a community health worker?
<>Strict definition: "Under general supervision, performs clinical and limited outreach duties related to preventive and supportive health care services in a variety of public health programs; performs related work as assigned." Basically, any health care worker who supplies health care in clinics, field settings, public emergencies and the like.
What is it like being a patient receiving mental health care when you are also a mental health care worker?
Well I am not a mental healthcare worker, but my spouse is one and most of our friends are as well. It's actually standard procedure for a mental health professional to go to regular therapy since they are dealing with many other people's issues. It's actually required, but many don’t becassarily follow that guideline.Going beyond regular therapy, mental health workers are people too. Thy have depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety etc. They typically know it's ok to seek help when needed and most of them know how to go about doing it. To me it seems like they can be a step ahead of things when recieving their own mental healthcare because they usually have an existing understanding Of the processes involved.Recieveing mental health is healthy at any level and this is something they already understand going into it.
Healthcare assistant Job?
There isn't really a set definition for "healthcare assistant", so this is really hard to answer. This is not a term that I've ever heard in the US with any kind of profesional accreditation. Could you be using the wrong term or could it be a made up title? If you have diagnosed anxiety, then you need to sit down with your psychiatrist and discuss your ability to perform under these conditions.
Why are psychopaths attracted to careers in mental health?
There are care takers with narcissistic and sadistic traits who find mental health care work an excellent playground to subtly abuse patients for self gratification purposes, especially at care units for the criminally insane as well as other closed mental health care facilities.Patients at such institutions are extra vulnerable to physical and psychological mistreatment, as it’s often difficult to determine when a patient truly has been abused by someone due to their mental disability.Patients can sometimes claim that they have been mistreated by a care taker when in reality it had been due to a delusion or hallucination. Other times when the abuse had really happened, the suspected abuser can easily use this as an excuse to get away with it.An example that occurs with certain types of patients, such as those suffering from dementia, schizophrenia and other medical disorders is when a care taker gives a mental patient a simple hug. The next day the patient reports to the care taker’s superiors that they had been sexually assaulted by that care taker.A protocol that a professional within psychiatric care should follow is to try and avoid having physical contact of any kind that suffer from severe mental disabilities in general, as there are a number of complications that can arise within the patients mind of its implications, such as the afore stated example.
Is it possible for a health care worker that works in the psychiatric units to become like his patients?
Unfortunately I have seen that happen to a male nurse who worked at a psychiatric hospital and it’s more alike than one might initially assume. It is a sad story.He was a former co-worker of my mother. My mother worked as a psychatric nurse and is now retired. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and now is a patient at the same place he previously worked at himself. Initially his career went ok and he was able to work fine, but things went arigh when he was busy with a makeover of his new home. He spent way too much time on it and wasn’t able to relax outside of work hours. During a manic episode he ultimately had a burnout and subsequent crash. He lost inhibitions and wasn’t able to function anymore as a psychiatric nurse and finally lost his job. As far as I know he still lives in a container dwelling on the compound.