Time to go where the evidence leads in Mental Health care

Time to go where the evidence leads in Mental Health care, says Counsellor.

“The alarming revelation that over 80,000 New Zealanders are using Anti-Psychotic drugs, some of them children, alongside the fact that 10% of the population is now taking medication for mental health issues, is a clarion call for both the Government and stakeholders to fully review all of the evidence of what constitutes effective mental health care” says Steve Taylor, Director of 24-7 Ltd, and a Mental Health Outcomes Researcher.

Some of the essential aspects of this evidence review will need to include:

1/ There is no pathology or test anywhere in the world that can accurately assess a brains “chemical imbalance”, a key assumption in the prescription of anti-depressant medication.

2/ There is a growing body of evidence that children should not be prescribed mood altering drugs.

3/ Medication has shown in clinical trials to only partially assist the most severe cases of negative mental health, and then no better or worse than placebo (fake) medications.

4/ Self-help strategies such as exercise, relaxation, and stress management have been shown to be effective, low cost interventions for people suffering from depression.

5/ 75% to 80% of people who undergo Counselling (referred to in the literature as “talk therapy”) experience improved mental health outcomes, and this finding has been research validated across individual, couple, family, and group talk therapies.

6/ The therapeutic relationship, the therapists allegiance to a method of treatment, the mutual negotiation of collaborative client-therapist goal setting, and the procurement of regular client feedback on progress are the most empirically significant indicators for successful mental health intervention, and far and away outstrip the efficacy of psychiatric medication.

7/ With some clients in specific treatment contexts, research has shown the use of medication may enhance the efficacy of talk therapy, and vice versa.

8/ Very few mental health intervention programmes are subject to adequate Outcome Research scrutiny, and are funded on a “heads in beds” basis, as opposed to being funded on the basis of results efficacy for clients.

9/ The DSM IV TR, the “bible” of mental health diagnosis for Clinical Psychologists and Psychiatrists, is itself currently undergoing a growing credibility problem as a legitimate tool for diagnosis, with one author labelling the publication “Bull****”. The DSM IV TR is currently undergoing a re-writing process, a process that has been delayed owing to ongoing infighting within the Psychiatric profession and the American Psychiatric Association, publishers of the DSM IV TR.

“As with many aspects of Social Service provision in New Zealand, and with an increasingly finite budget, mental health services must look beyond ideology and convenience, and into the evidence of what constitutes affordable and effacious mental health outcomes for clients – an increasingly medicated society for life’s varying degrees of struggles and crises is not a sustainable proposition long term for New Zealand, nor a necessary one” said Mr Taylor.

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