A discussion about Mental Health Care

• IggyPride00

  

  I saw this tweeted out from ABC's Jake Tapper, and it is pretty powerful to read in light of what has happened. It's long, but it really is worth reading.
  
  My thoughts below the fold (so to speak).
  
  
  http://anarchistsoccermom.blogspot.com/2012/12/thinking-unthinkable.html?m=1
  
  
  How do we start to address the woeful options for mental health treatment in this country?
  
  It is usually one of hte first things cut from city and state budgets, and private insurance considers it nothing more than a red headed step-child as far as benefits they willingly pay out for it vs. other more tangible illnesses/medical conditions. Medicaid benefits for it are largely terrible as well.
  
  Fact is that effective treatment is usually really costly because the visits to doctors are frequent, and the medicines usually really expensive.
  
  Many people have very limited options in effectively dealing with a mental illness given the way the system works unless they happen to be independently wealthy or have access to Cadillac level health plans.
  
  In many ways it dovetails into the larger conversation about access to healthcare in general in this country, but what do we do to increase people who need its access to treatment so that they can become contributing members of society as opposed to dangers to it.
  
  To me this whole sad ordeal is almost less about guns and more about how a woeful healthcare system that continues to let these people slip through the cracks without proper treatment.
  
  We need to be educating parents and kids about the fact that mental illness is a real thing, and something to be taken seriously. It can happen to anyone, and just the same it needs to be treated as seriously as if you had cancer, or any other real tangible disease.
• gut

  I'll put it in terms of ROI....it's really tough to treat effectively, mush less from a cost perspective.
  
  The latest consequences are really tough, but are we willing to spend $100B to try to prevent it ineffectively?
• believer

  

  gut;1344232 wrote:I'll put it in terms of ROI....it's really tough to treat effectively, mush less from a cost perspective.
  
  The latest consequences are really tough, but are we willing to spend $100B to try to prevent it ineffectively?

  Sounds like ObamaKare Part II.
• LJ

  

  First thing they need to do is HEAVILY enforce the requirment to report mental health status to NICS. There are so many states where the databases do not speak to each other, and because of that, NICS will clear a sale.
  
  Second they need to make an online quick NICS check available for free for private sellers. Not a requirement, but just something that gives private sellers the ability to check someone out.
  
  While it doesn't directly impact the treatment of those mentally impaired, it does heavily impact their immediate access to weapons.
• gut

  Yeah, but this kid stole his mom's guns.
  
  You are probably right that it would help. I'm not sure how much, though. I would guess most of these people got their guns before they progressed to a point where they wouldn't have been able to.
• LJ

  

  gut;1344359 wrote:Yeah, but this kid stole his mom's guns.
  
  You are probably right that it would help. I'm not sure how much, though. I would guess most of these people got their guns before they progressed to a point where they wouldn't have been able to.

  Pretty sure Aurora shooter and the VT shooter got their guns and shouldn't have been able to. It wouldn't stop everything, but the biggest thing is, the first one is already law. Why not properly enforce the laws we already have, and see how that goes?
• gut

  LJ;1344448 wrote:Pretty sure Aurora shooter and the VT shooter got their guns and shouldn't have been able to. It wouldn't stop everything, but the biggest thing is, the first one is already law. Why not properly enforce the laws we already have, and see how that goes?

  I agree. And while it may be "easy" to get an illegal firearm, are these guys really going into the hood and randomly start asking where they can buy a gun? Maybe just find a drug dealer and they'll hook you up, but they would be more likely to just rob the guy and keep their guns.
• fan_from_texas

  gut;1344232 wrote:I'll put it in terms of ROI....it's really tough to treat effectively, mush less from a cost perspective.
  
  The latest consequences are really tough, but are we willing to spend $100B to try to prevent it ineffectively?

  
  This. People like to talk about how if only we didn't cut this funding, problems like this wouldn't happen. That type of thinking is lunacy, if you'll pardon the turn of phrase. Mental health issues aren't an easy check-the-box and go on your way sort of thing. The majority of Americans are treated for mental health issues at some point in their life, and many issues (including personality disorders) are essentially incurable and generally harmless. There aren't a lot of options for many people with serious mental illness other than locking them up forever in prsion or asylums, and that's overkill for the vast majority.
• WebFire

  Was the CT shooter actually diagnosed with something?
• fan_from_texas

  WebFire;1344721 wrote:Was the CT shooter actually diagnosed with something?

  
  I saw that he was diagnosed with an undisclosed personality disorder.
• LJ

  

  I thought he was autistic.
  
  It's not very publicized, but violence is very common in autistic people as they get older.
• Mulva

  

  WebFire;1344721 wrote:Was the CT shooter actually diagnosed with something?

  I saw an article that said he had Asperger's.
• fan_from_texas

  ccrunner609;1344922 wrote:I have a few kids that have this/. THey are the neatest kids in the world. THey are affectionate, very personable and smart

  
  Pretty much every engineer in the US is diagnosable with Asperger's. Most people in the US are diagnosable with something out of the DSM.
• Abe Vigoda

  

  LJ;1344783 wrote:I thought he was autistic.
  
  It's not very publicized, but violence is very common in autistic people as they get older.

  Asperger is not a mental illness, it is an developmental disorder.
• LJ

  

  Abe Vigoda;1345523 wrote:Asperger is not a mental illness, it is an developmental disorder.

  Why did you quote me?
• fan_from_texas

  Abe Vigoda;1345523 wrote:Asperger is not a mental illness, it is an developmental disorder.

  
  In common parlance, it counts. I believe it was just dropped from the DSM V, if I recall correctly, but it's certainly within the general understand of a mental illness.
• FatHobbit

  

  LJ;1344343 wrote:First thing they need to do is HEAVILY enforce the requirment to report mental health status to NICS. There are so many states where the databases do not speak to each other, and because of that, NICS will clear a sale.

  I agree with this. There is no point trying to make new laws when the old ones are not implemented correctly.
  

  LJ;1344343 wrote:Second they need to make an online quick NICS check available for free for private sellers. Not a requirement, but just something that gives private sellers the ability to check someone out.

  I agree with this in theory, but I'm not sure how you could make sure someone was using that info to sell a firearm. What's to stop a prospective employer from calling in to check you out or maybe even a nosy neighbor?
• FatHobbit

  

  fan_from_texas;1344978 wrote:Pretty much every engineer in the US is diagnosable with Asperger's.

  Does that mean that Aspergers means you can do math?
  
  I used to work with a guy who everyone said had Aspergers. I just thought it was an excuse for him to be an asshole.
• LJ

  

  FatHobbit;1345570 wrote:I agree with this. There is no point trying to make new laws when the old ones are not implemented correctly.
  
  
  
  I agree with this in theory, but I'm not sure how you could make sure someone was using that info to sell a firearm. What's to stop a prospective employer from calling in to check you out or maybe even a nosy neighbor?

  Lot's of employers already run a NICS style check through 3rd party vendors.
• Mulva

  

  fan_from_texas;1345541 wrote:In common parlance, it counts. I believe it was just dropped from the DSM V, if I recall correctly, but it's certainly within the general understand of a mental illness.

  If V is the one coming out this spring, I saw that Asperger's isn't being dropped, but it's being rolled into "autism spectrum".
• fan_from_texas

  Mulva;1345871 wrote:If V is the one coming out this spring, I saw that Asperger's isn't being dropped, but it's being rolled into "autism spectrum".

  
  That sounds right. Mrs. FFT is a psychotherapist and talks about this stuff, but I'm only tangentially aware of it. I believe the term itself is being dropped, but the disorder is now being rolled into the autism spectrum.
• Abe Vigoda

  

  fan_from_texas;1345541 wrote:In common parlance, it counts. I believe it was just dropped from the DSM V, if I recall correctly, but it's certainly within the general understand of a mental illness.

  Mental retardation is also in the DSM but clearly not a mental illness. You do know the difference between an mental illness and a developmental disability correct? Asperger and Asperger spectrum disorders are life long developmental disabilities with no cure. There is a big difference. In addition here is a press release regarding the misconception of any possible link between autism and violence.
  

  No evidence exists to link autism and premeditated violence. Suggesting otherwise is wrong and harmful to the more than 1.5 million individuals living with autism in the United States.[SUP]1[/SUP]
  
  Individuals with autism and those with other disabilities are more likely to be victims of violence than the perpetrators.[SUP]2[/SUP]
  
  Many of individuals with Asperger’s syndrome who have committed crimes had co-existing psychiatric disorders.[SUP]3[/SUP]
  
  Individuals with autism who act aggressively typically do so because they are reacting to a situation.
  
  Please do not judge any individual with autism based on the discourse surrounding Friday’s tragic event. Instead, please strive to educate and inform your communities. Help the Autism Society ensure that individuals with autism are not marginalized due to a misunderstanding of a complicated disorder.

  http://www.autism-society.org/news/press-releases/autism-society-statement-on.html
• fan_from_texas

  Abe Vigoda;1347138 wrote:Mental retardation is also in the DSM but clearly not a mental illness. You do know the difference between an mental illness and a developmental disability correct? Asperger and Asperger spectrum disorders are life long developmental disabilities with no cure. There is a big difference. In addition here is a press release regarding the misconception of any possible link between autism and violence.

  I'm not sure why you're so hung up on the distinction here, which I think is essentially meaningless for the purposes of discussion here. Within common understanding, I suspect most people would consider Asperger's to be a mental illness in common parlance, while they would not consider mental retardation to be. The fact that something is essentially "incurable" isn't particularly germane, unless you similarly want to apply that reasoning to personality disorders.
  
  I appreciate the link you've provided, but is that directed toward me? I haven't suggested any link between autism and violence. In fact, I was suggesting the opposite--there's no need to glom on to the idea that his Asperger's (if he indeed had that) had anything to do with the violence, since lots and lots and lots of Americans are diagnosable with Asperger's, and they're not out doing crazy things.
  
  You seem especially sensitive on this point, and I'm not sure your ire is correctly directed at me here.
• Abe Vigoda

  

  fan_from_texas;1347155 wrote:I'm not sure why you're so hung up on the distinction here, which I think is essentially meaningless for the purposes of discussion here. Within common understanding, I suspect most people would consider Asperger's to be a mental illness in common parlance, while they would not consider mental retardation to be. The fact that something is essentially "incurable" isn't particularly germane, unless you similarly want to apply that reasoning to personality disorders.
  
  I appreciate the link you've provided, but is that directed toward me? I haven't suggested any link between autism and violence. In fact, I was suggesting the opposite--there's no need to glom on to the idea that his Asperger's (if he indeed had that) had anything to do with the violence, since lots and lots and lots of Americans are diagnosable with Asperger's, and they're not out doing crazy things.
  
  You seem especially sensitive on this point, and I'm not sure your ire is correctly directed at me here.

  There are several posts on here that are not factual. The thread is about mental health care. I only intended to educate those who don't really know what they are talking about. I have been in the field of DD services for 30 years. You seem to be a little overly sensitive about being corrected. DD serevices are funded much better in this country than mental illness. If you want to really add to this thread, you really should understand the differences.