Challenges Faced by Service Perticipants in Mental Health and how Social Worker could Apply an Intersectional Lens when Working with Service Participants in Mental Health
QUESTIONS
1. Discuss some of the challenges that might
be faced by service participants in mental health in relation to disadvantage,
oppression, and marginalisation (900 words)
2. Discuss how a Social Worker could apply an intersectional lens when
working with service participants in mental health. What would a Social Worker
need to consider when thinking about issues of power and privilege in their
work with service participants? (900 words).
QUESTION
1
Introduction
Mental
health issues are a serious issue that needs careful and coordinated care to
handle. However, studies have shown that in the course of seeking mental
healthcare, participants face a number of challenges. These challenges are more
manifest with vulnerable groups in society, who are marginalized, oppressed,
and disadvantaged in terms of their access to mental health services. Thus, it
is crucial to look at these challenges as a clear understanding would lead to
an even clearer solution. This is the main purpose of this research, which
seeks to discuss the challenges faced by mental health participants in relation
to marginalization, oppression, and disadvantages.
Challenges
faced by mental health service participants include marginalization,
oppression, and disadvantage.
Although
advancements made in research and technology have significantly improved how
diseases are prevented and treated, studies suggest a disproportionate
distribution of these advances across social classes (Havranek et al., 2015).
There is a higher burden of chronic diseases for people with lower
socioeconomic status, in vulnerable races, classes, and other minority groups
that are deprived for one reason or the other (Havranek et al., 2015). To
demonstrate this claim, studies in the United States have found that
non-Hispanic blacks are more likely to experience cardiovascular disease (CVD)
mortality (Mensah et al., 2005). Therefore, mental health participants also
face similar challenges in relation to marginalization, oppression, and being
disadvantaged. Discussion of some of those issues is as below.
Marginalization
The
unfortunate truth is that some of the outcomes of mental health diseases are
not the product of healthcare received during such illness but influenced by
other societal factors like employment, social services, basic needs, and
education, and they exert an important influence on the overall health of
patients (Bamberg, Chiswell, & Toumbourou, 2011). These factors are known
as societal determinants of health (SDH) and they are distributed inadequately
across class, race, gender, sexual orientation, minority groups, and
socioeconomic strata. There is a correlation between them and the
disproportionate burden of mental health issues in these vulnerable groups
(Heidenreich, Trogdon, & Khavjou, 2011). Marginalized people are
individuals that suffer from these inequalities and disparities (Meleis &
Im, 1999; Venkatapuram, Bell, & Marmot, 2010). As defined by Hall et al.
(1994), marginalization is the process by which patients are peripheralized
based on their associations, identified, environment, and expression. Due to
their existing health conditions, mental health participants are marginalized
in a number of ways. In the first place, they could be marginalized because
they lack proper understanding and comprehension to disclose and discuss the
challenges they face, and in the absence of guidance, they might end up not
receiving any care. Studies have shown that even during service delivery,
studies have shown that they are neglected in some cases due to their mental
health challenges (Baah et al., 2019). Even in the government’s provisions for
healthcare, there are limited stimulus plans for mental health patients when
compared to other patients suffering from chronic diseases. The impact of such
marginalization is that they don’t receive adequate care and it forces their
condition upwards (Baah et al., 2019).
Oppression
Oppression
and marginalization work hand in hand. Through marginalization, physical,
psychological, and emotional boundaries are created and they are experienced by
the affected people through their societal interactions (Koci et al., 2012).
For instance, when one is in an abusive relationship, the abuser is known to
exert psychological control over the abused. What this control does is that it
creates a psychological and emotional barrier to the outside world. Similar to
the imaginary and physical boundaries that exist between an abuser and the
abused in developed and impoverished societies, the rich and poor, there are
also boundaries between the oppressor and the oppressed, and it does deny the
vulnerable group the chance to access mainstream resources (Gueta, 2017). This
boundary is used to divide socioeconomic and political resources unevenly, with
improvements in healthcare services disproportionately distributed across race,
sexual orientation, gender, geographic region, and culture (Baah et al., 2019).
Essentially, what it means is that the mental health participants in these oppressed
regions, regardless of race or gender, will not have full access to mainstream
healthcare services that can potentially improve their conditions. Thus,
instead of getting better, their health condition will keep deteriorating.
Disadvantage
Through
marginalization and oppression, vulnerable groups are disadvantaged in their
access to mental health services (Fleming et al., 2017).The disadvantages
include a lack of health care facilities within their communities, which forces
them to travel far when they need them; a lack of proper communication and
understanding with the health care service providers; and profiling designed to
completely deny them (or limit) their access to health care services (Baah et
al., 2019). As a result of these disadvantages, the vulnerable groups show a
lack of intention to seek health care services when they face mental health
issues, and it makes their conditions worse. Even when they decide to seek such
services, they might not have the necessary resources or support to clearly
present their case and follow-up until full treatment. They are forced to
either self-care or sit it out at home, becoming a liability to themselves and
the people around them, while making their mental health conditions more
adverse (Muoz-Laboy et al., 2017).
Conclusion
The discussions above show that the outcome of medical care is not only a product of the way the medical care was delivered, as it is also influenced by societal determinants of health. These determinants, as considered in this research, are: marginalization, oppression, and disadvantage. As discussed above, marginalization denies certain groups of people access to mainstream healthcare and it is normally born out of the oppression that this group has been subjected to for years. Due to that, they are disadvantageous as they cannot access desired health care, reducing their intention to seek such services and worsening their conditions in the process.
QUESTION
2
Introduction
Social
work is the core regulator of oppressive behavior as it is founded on
delivering social justice. However, social workers can sometimes apply an
espoused perspective to a group when delivering social work. It has the effect
of limiting their overall ability to adopt a broader perspective and critically
address the issue at its root.In consideration of that, this entry is designed
to assess how social workers can apply an intersectional lens when working with
service participants in mental health in order to avert having a blurred view
of the situation they seek to address; and what they could do when faced with
the issue of challenge and power in delivering social work to participants.
How
a social worker could apply an intersectional lens when working with service
participants in mental health
In
a nutshell, intersectionality is a tool employed in analyzing how the
interaction and intersection of different forms of oppression (such as ableism,
racism, ageism, sexism, classism, heterosexism, and so on) influence lived
experience (Bernard, 2020). Today, it is recognized as one of the influential
approaches in feminism that is used to make sense of the manifestation of
inequalities among individuals and groups (Bernard, 2020).
While
it might seem obvious, medical professionals need constant reminders that
whether the people who have mental issues are older people, people with
disabilities or marginalized in care, they all manifest certain social entities
like gender, age, disability, class, sexuality and race. Therefore, the way
they live their experience through medical care is significantly influenced by
these identified categories (Crenshaw, 1991). Therefore, it is imperative that
social workers apply an intersectionality lens when working with people with
mental health issues.
To
address this issue, social workers should broaden their perspective in order to
see the whole person (Lammy, 2017). In many ways,
intersectionality is pivotal for navigating the different and complex needs of
mental health participants who are members of an oppressed group. That is to
say, interrogating the issues, and not the person, from an intersectional
(broad) view allows the social workers to have a more critical grasp, not only
of the exact dynamism at play for the person involved, but also of the daily
challenges the social workers face in relation to organizational context and
policy.
For
social workers, intersectionality aligns with their value as it is concerned
with oppression, power, emancipatory practices, and social justice. Therefore,
wearing a lens of intersectionality allows social workers to interrogate the
structural causes of the issues and problems that the people who seek their
services face (Goff et al., 2014). This is only possible by broadening their
perspective and seeing the person from the situation under interrogation and
not from any stereotypical lens they might be wearing about the person
(relative to race, gender, sexual orientation or any other element).
Perhaps
more fundamentally, experiencing intersectionality can help them expand their
knowledge of how different diverse groups experience different forms of
expression. Therefore, it will help the social worker to better understand the
experience of their subjects in order to build a strength-based relationship
with them while delivering their services. It is only a broadened view that
sees the whole person that can make such an outcome a reality (Goff et al.,
2014).
What
would a social worker need to consider when thinking about issues of power and
privilege in their work with service participants?
Spencer
(2008) documented personal reflections of power, privilege, and oppression as a
social worker, highlighting what a social worker might consider when thinking
about the issues of power and privilege in the discharge of service to
participants. Reflecting on the work of Paulo Freire (1970), the social worker
must understand that social justice is the core value of social work (National
Association of Social Workers (NASW) 2007), and commitment to social justice
requires an ethical and moral attitude towards equality, together with a solid
belief in the capacity of people as change agents capable of transforming the
world.
Furthermore,
in order to create social change as well as promote social justice, the social
worker needs to begin the entire process with him or herself—made possible
through a self-reflective approach that continually assesses the contradictions
between their espoused values and the experience they live through. Thus, the
social worker must believe that all people, irrespective of their groups
(dominant or targeted), play a pivotal role in eliminating oppression and
generating a vision for a future that is socially just. This is because if
people from the oppressed group do not take on this responsibility, the
likelihood of attaining this desired vision becomes weakened.
Therefore,
when faced with such a challenge, the social worker needs to understand the
overall purpose and value of social work, ensuring unrivaled focus on the need
to deliver social justice to all people, irrespective of their groups, and
never be part of the oppressors causing social injustice. A good leader must be
willing to lead by example, and if that be the case, of what essence is their
social work when they are part of the problem they are trying to solve? How
will people be encouraged to continue on their path if they drift from that
path? Thus, the only solution to this issue is self-reminder and reflection,
focusing on the core values of social work in order to create a more equal and
just society.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is pivotal that social workers apply an intersectional lens when handling clients with mental health issues in order to avoid bias judgments that can lead to poor service delivery. They need to look beyond the group the person comes from and focus more on interrogating the issue at hand in order to deliver a quality solution. Additionally, when they are faced with issues of privilege and power while delivering services to mental health participants, they should remember the core values of social work and never depart from them. They should always lead by example and never become the same social problem they are struggling to eliminate.
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