Mental Illness and Rights

[Yamori]

What is your take on individual liberties and mental illness?

Do you think it is right/fair that someone who is perceived to have mental illness should be held against their will in a hospital if the staff determines they should be?

As you may know, if someone goes to a mental hospital (voluntarily or not), and the staff decides a person is unfit to make their own decisions (and sometimes even if they ARE fit to make decisions), they can hold them by force indefinitely.

Could this be an abusable power that can be used to circumvent individual liberties of people deemed "unseemly" by the government someday? Is this an absolutely necessary policy to have? How does the ability to be detained indefinitely due to odd behavior with no suspected criminal activity reflect on our perceived individual rights, if at all?

[Lyion]

What is your take on individual liberties and mental illness?

I'm not very fond of the current laws we have in place.

Do you think it is right/fair that someone who is perceived to have mental illness should be held against their will in a hospital if the staff determines they should be?

Only if they are capable of being a harm to themselves or others. There should be mitigating circumstances. This should not preclude their rights.

As you may know, if someone goes to a mental hospital (voluntarily or not), and the staff decides a person is unfit to make their own decisions (and sometimes even if they ARE fit to make decisions), they can hold them by force indefinitely.

Yes and no. patients retain rights, but certainly not enough.

Could this be an abusable power that can be used to circumvent individual liberties of people deemed "unseemly" by the government someday? Is this an absolutely necessary policy to have? How does the ability to be detained indefinitely due to odd behavior with no suspected criminal activity reflect on our perceived individual rights, if at all?

We need policies to protect people, even if it's just against themselves. However there needs to be a fine line, and there certainly are cases where rights are infringed on.

[veeneedefeesh]

The procedure for holding someone in a mental hospital "against their will" involves the local coroner (WTF?) and the qualifying condition is that the person must be "A danger to themself or others". A psychiatrist (basically a glorified drug dealer as that most psychiatrists in a mental hospital rarely interact with the patients, psychologists do most of the interaction and make recomendations for perscriptions, but a psychiatrist is needed to actually perscribe the drugs) can hold a patient for a maximum of 72 hours. Once that 72 hours is up the patient must be released AMA (against medical advice) or the coroner must sign a confinement order which is only good for 30 days and must be re-evaluated and signed again to continue confinement. If a patient truly is a danger to themselves or others and is released and then perform some horrific act, the hospital is liable, and subject to suit. If they are not a danger and they are not released then the hospital is subject to suit for unlawful confinement, this is hard to prove however and rarely sticks unless it is a flagrant abuse of power. All things considered it is a rather sticky situation and the hospital/doctors and is a difficult balancing act at best. The hospital that I worked in would usually err on the side of personal freedom, but that may have been because it was a completely state funded/run hospital.

It is usually fairly obvious as to who needs to be confined and who gets to go home. If you are actively hallucinating chances are you are getting a 30 day vacation in the Rubber Ramada, If you are violent toward the staff and yourself, then hopefully you brought your swimming trunks, because you are probably in for a stay at the Haldol Holiday Inn, but if you are somewhat calm and composed then chances are you are going home. Being rational is the key here.

Also as a minor (whom I mostly dealt with) the parents/guardian can sign a 30 day confinement order, which in the case of children happens much more often than a coroners confinement. Children should not be confined for OD (Oppositional-Defiance) unless they are violent, but you might be surprised how many parents look at mental hospitals as gov't subsidized summer camp, with the added bonus of SSI checks inc to aforementioned parents.

Actually this kind of confinement as a governmental tool for silence doesnt scare me nearly as badly as the guy that was held at Guantanimo Bay for 12+ months without seeing a lawyer, never was charged with a crime (he was termed a terrorist, but no specific charges were filed), and then was released without an a trial or public explanation (hello if he was dangerous enough to confine for a year then why the hell are we letting he go?!?). Thanks Big Bro...errrm...Patriot Act.