Key Tenets of Recovery in Mental Healthcare

1. The recovery model in the mental healthcare is the holistic and person centered approach to mental health care of the patients suffering from mental health issues. This approach to healthcare is mainly based on the beliefs that it is possible for service users to be recovered from the mental health illness in order to live full satisfying lives and the best way to achieve this is by providing patient centered care to the service users that aligns with their needs and requirements (Slade et al. 2014). The researchers are of the opinion that recovery mediated approach mainly wants to develop the quality of the entire life of the individual and not only the particular symptoms with which the individual represent themselves to the healthcare professionals. This approach mainly involves helping the service users in finding hope and developing self-esteem as well as resilience helping the service users to develop a sense of purpose and meaning in their own lives. This also helps the service users to develop healthy relationships with people in the community and thereby gain independence in their lives.

The healthcare professionals caring for mental health service users need to have a clear idea about the concept of recovery and differentiate it clearly form the term “cure”. This procedure concentrates on an individual as a whole person rather than just symptoms that require caring for. The components of recovery that are integrated in the caring of the patient ensure that the patient gains and retains hope and understand their own ability and disabilities (LeBoutilier et al. 2015).  It would help them to be engaged in their active lives, experience personal autonomy, social identity and thereby understand the meaning and purpose in life helping to develop the positive sense of self. The integration of hope, healing as well as empowerment and  connection along with the implementation of the human rights, positive culture of healing and recovery oriented services in the care plan of the professionals would ensure better quality life of the service users  helping them to overcome all barriers in their lives.

One of the most important principles is the uniqueness of the individual as well as supporting for real choices of the service users. The recovery approach of healthcare should not only concentrate on curing but would be mainly giving opportunities to the individuals for making choices and helping individuals in living a meaningful, satisfying as well as purposeful lives and to be considered as a valued member of the community (Park et al. 2014). The healthcare professionals need to maintain a practice that would accept the recovery outcomes to be personal and unique for each of the individuals. This practice should go beyond an exclusive focus on health so that they could also emphasize on the social inclusion as well as the quality of lives. The healthcare professionals need to empower the individuals so that they can recognize themselves to be at the centre of the care they would receive. They need to support and empower the service users helping them to make their own choices about the ways by which they want to lead their own lives. The recovery-oriented practices should be also supporting individuals to build their own strengths so that the service users can take as much responsibility for their lives as they can at any particular time.

Applications of Recovery in Mental Healthcare

Another important tenet of the recovery is ensuring practicing of the correct attitudes and rights towards the mental health consumers and at the same time maintain the dignity and respect of the patient. The healthcare professionals need to first listen and learn by acting upon the communication from the individuals as well as their carers regarding what are important to the individuals in their lives (Kidd, Kenny & McKinstry 2015). They would then need to promote and protect the citizenship, legal as well as human rights of the service users and thereby support the individuals in maintaining and developing the recreational, social, and occupational as well as the vocational activities that are meaningful to the loves of the individuals. The healthcare professionals need to respect the dignity of the service users by being courteous as well as respectful and honest in all-important interactions. They need to involve sensitivity and respect for their values, beliefs, culture, and challenges all form of stigmatization and stigma that exists within their services in the broader community.

Another important aspect or the tenet of the recovery approach is the effective partnership and communication and proper evaluation of the recovery. The healthcare professionals undertaking this approach should value about the importance of sharing relevant information as well as the need to communicate effectively with the service users for communicating clearly for enabling the effective engagement (Slade et al. 2015). They would need to acknowledge that every service users is the expert of their own lives and that recovery should be involving working in collaboration and partnership with the service users and their carers in a way that makes sense to them. Effective evaluation of the services for tracking their progress should be also included.

2. Recovery oriented mental health services can be referred to the practice where the healthcare professionals need to ensure a set of capabilities that help in supporting people with mental health disorders so that they can recognize and thereby take responsibilities for their own recoveries and well-being. This would help them in defining their goals, wishes and aspirations providing them the urge to make their lives beautiful. One of the most important strategies that the healthcare nurses would be undertaking is the promotion of the culture as well as the language of hope and optimism. It is one of the best ways by which, professionals can develop therapeutic relationship with the patients. These would help the patients feel valued, welcome, important and safe. The professionals would need to communicate positive expectations and ensure promoting of hope and optimism and these would make the patients believe that the nurses are genuinely interested in their care and well-being. Secondly, the nurses need to put the patients at the centre of the practice and service delivery and view the situation of the patients’ life holistically (Goodyear et al. 2015).  This would make the patient feel empowered and make them develop a bonding with the nurses and hence therapeutic relationship is developed. Often mental health patients are still stigmatized and therefore society tends to exclude them. They feel powerless, as they do not get respect and affection from society. Therefore, when nursing professionals put them in the centre of decision-making, they feel cared, respected and empowered. The healthcare professionals need to promote autonomy and self-determination of the patients and focus on the strengths and capabilities of taking personal responsibility of the patients. This is also another effective way of developing therapeutic relationship with them.

Importance of Person-Centered Care in Mental Healthcare

In most of the cases, it is seen that mental health patients suffer from stigmatization and discrimination in the different aspects of their life due to their ill mental condition. They tend to withdraw themselves (Le Boutilier et al. 2015). They feel powerless and they tend to lose their confidence of taking decisions, responsibilities and caring for themselves. Development of therapeutic relationship thereby helps them to gradually overcome the different barriers they face towards better lives and reconstruct their lives on a new note (Yanos et al. 2015). The nursing professionals also have the duty of advocating for the need of the service and work environments with an organizational culture which will be conducive to recovery. Accordingly, they should also advocate for the need to build a workforce to be not only skilled but also well equipped, supported as well as resourced for recovery-oriented practices. The more skilled the nurses and the better resources that are available will help in ensuring quality care and uninterrupted service that will ensure patient satisfaction and better scope of therapeutic relationship development can be ensured. The nursing professionals also need to take possible actions by which they can enhance social inclusion, work on the social determinants of the health in order to develop the mental and well-being of the patients. This would increase trust on the professionals and ensure better relationship building with the patients. They need to work on a wider scale for supporting the social inclusion as well as advocacy on the social determinants (Slade & Longden 2015). They also need to challenge the stigmatizing attitudes and discrimination of the society and engage in partnership with the communities so that people gradually become aware of the concept of mental well being and support people who are going through difficult days improper mental health condition. 

Development of therapeutic relationship mainly helps the nurses to show compassion and empathy towards the mental health patient. This makes them believe that the professionals genuinely care for their well-being and are not judgmental about their present condition. These release their anxiety and help them to feel better. Development of therapeutic communication ensures positive interaction with the patients. Through these, the professionals can ensure that they do not support stigmatization and discriminations that will help in development of mutual trust and bond with the clients (Bond et al. 2014). The better the bonding and the trust, the patients will be able to pour out the clients of the heart to the professionals discussing the important aspects that are bothering them and creating barriers in their lives. These would help the nurses to realize the main factors affecting patients and thereby help in their recovery. Therapeutic relationship enables the service user to feel comfortable in the presence of the service provider that thereby allows them to work in partnership in a collaborative manner and these results out on positive health outcomes of the patients and better recovery of both mental and physical health.

References:

Bond, G. R., Drake, R. E., McHugo, G. J., Peterson, A. E., Jones, A. M., & Williams, J. 2014. ‘Long-term sustainability of evidence-based practices in community mental health agencies’. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research, vol 41 no 2, pp228-236.

Goodyear, M., Hill, T. L., Allchin, B., McCormick, F., Hine, R., Cuff, R., & O’hanlon, B. 2015. ‘Standards of practice for the adult mental health workforce: Meeting the needs of families where a parent has a mental illness’. International Journal of Mental Health Nursing, vol 24 no 2,pp 169-180.

Kidd, S., Kenny, A., & McKinstry, C. 2015. ‘The meaning of recovery in a regional mental health service: an action research study’. Journal of Advanced Nursing, vol 71(1), pp181-192.

Le Boutillier, C., Chevalier, A., Lawrence, V., Leamy, M., Bird, V. J., Macpherson, R., … & Slade, M. 2015. ‘Staff understanding of recovery-orientated mental health practice: a systematic review and narrative synthesis’. Implementation Science, vol 10 no 1, pp87.

Le Boutillier, C., Slade, M., Lawrence, V., Bird, V. J., Chandler, R., Farkas, M., … & Shepherd, G. 2015. ‘Competing priorities: staff perspectives on supporting recovery’. Administration and Policy in Mental Health and Mental Health Services Research, vol 42 no4, pp429-438.

Park, M. M., Zafran, H., Stewart, J., Salsberg, J., Ells, C., Rouleau, S., … & Valente, T. W. 2014. ‘Transforming mental health services: a participatory mixed methods study to promote and evaluate the implementation of recovery-oriented services’. Implementation science, vol 9 no 1, pp119.

Slade, M., & Longden, E. 2015. Empirical evidence about recovery and mental health. BMC psychiatry, vol 15 no 1,pp 285.

Slade, M., Amering, M., Farkas, M., Hamilton, B., O’Hagan, M., Panther, G., … & Whitley, R. 2014. ‘Uses and abuses of recovery: implementing recovery?oriented practices in mental health systems’. World Psychiatry, vol 13 no.1, pp12-20.

Slade, M., Bird, V., Clarke, E., Le Boutillier, C., McCrone, P., Macpherson, R., … & Leamy, M. 2015. ‘Supporting recovery in patients with psychosis through care by community-based adult mental health teams (REFOCUS): a multisite, cluster, randomised, controlled trial’. The Lancet Psychiatry, vol 2 no 6, pp503-514.

Yanos, P. T., Lucksted, A., Drapalski, A. L., Roe, D., & Lysaker, P. 2015. ‘Interventions targeting mental health self-stigma: A review and comparison’. Psychiatric rehabilitation journal, 38 no 2, 171.