Unmet Needs of People with Serious Mental Illness: Perspectives from Certified Peer Specialists

firemonkey · June 4, 2019, 11:11am

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Unmet Needs of People with Serious Mental Illness: Perspectives from Certified Peer Specialists.

KL Fortuna, J Ferron, SI Pratt, A Muralidharan, KA Aschbrenner, AM Williams, PE Deegan and M Salzer, The Psychiatric quarterly, Jun 2019 01

Examine the unmet needs of people with serious mental illness (SMI) from the perspective of certified peer specialists. 267 certified peer specialists from 38 states completed an online survey (female [73%], 50.9 [SD = 12] years, and non-Hispanic White [79.8%]). Many respondents reported a primary mental health diagnoses (n = 200), 22 respondents reported their diagnosis as schizophrenia spectrum disorder (11%), 46 respondents reported bipolar disorder (22.1%), 47 respondents reported major depressive disorder (22.6%), 29 respondents reported post-traumatic stress disorder (13.9%), 27 respondents reported alcohol/substance use disorder (13%), 2 respondents reported personality disorder (1%), and 12 reported "other" (5.8%). A mixed methods convergence analysis integrated quantitative with qualitative data. Social isolation (n = 160, 59.9%) and feeling lonely (n = 159, 59.6%) were the most highly endorsed unmet need, followed by the need to address chronic health conditions (n = 80, 30%), prevent mental health hospitalization (n = 71, 23.6%), and prevent drug use (n = 66, 24.7%). Four themes emerged: need to address basic necessities, loneliness and social isolation, hope, and addiction. Addressing loneliness and social isolation were identified as the primary unmet needs among people with SMI. Addressing co-morbid health conditions may simultaneously impact other unmet needs. Hope is an important intervention target. Initial insights from this study can be used to guide researchers' efforts to incorporate certified peer specialists perspectives in developing programs to meet the needs of people with SMI. Future research using participatory research methods can further examine these initial insights.

crimby · June 4, 2019, 12:40pm

I’ve found that it is possible to be in a comfortable apartment and have every creature comfort met and to be going out of your mind with frustration over your lack of human interaction. I don’t need a lot of socialization, but I do need at least some. You can’t make it like that.

Orbeezlight · June 5, 2019, 6:27am

Although distressing as my symptoms got me feeling everyone is dangerous, planning something and has hostile intentions. I find i rest and sleep deeper and for longer when I socialise, provided I’m not distressed

firemonkey · June 5, 2019, 6:38am

I 'm not proactive when it comes to socialising. I’ve always been the same from as far back as I can remember. I’ll be as polite and sociable as I can when with other people , and am never purposely rude, but sometimes due to the Asperger’s I can be socially inept.

I am not too bothered about seeing people in general . However if there is much of a gap in seeing my stepdaughter insecurity can kick in , as in ‘Has she got fed up with me ?’