Order Number |
3343546789 |
Type of Project |
ESSAY |
Writer Level |
PHD VERIFIED |
Format |
APA |
Academic Sources |
10 |
Page Count |
3-12 PAGES |
Discuss the unique emergency preparedness needs of patients with emotional and psychiatric patients.
I utilized the databases for disaster medicine and management and found a unique article from Psychiatric Services to the subject of emergency preparedness for mental health. Dr. Robert J. Ursano reviewed the book by Drs. Frederick J. Stoddard Jr., Anand Pandya and Craig L. Katz Disaster Psychiatry: Readiness, Evaluation, and Treatment. I shortened what can be a long response to the question of what goes in to preparing for mental illness in the event of a disaster. How could psychological first aid prepares us for such a difficult job in a chaotic environment. Mental illness has no face especially when it needs a professional to diagnosis many of the diseases associated with mental illness.
Physical injuries can be apparent and receive a level of severity making triage and treatment speedy. Looking over a person who could look necessarily normal may suffer from mental illness and transition to an unsafe condition without warning. Training and education come with diagnosing disaster victims with mental illness and getting the proper treatment, therapy or medication if they are showing new signs of phycological or psychiatric needs. How can professional’s diagnosis and separate those with special needs of mental health without being discriminatory?
“The first task of disaster mental health care is a needs assessment to determine resource allocation for the delivery of care. The volume thoroughly describes this task and explains its key importance to forming the disaster mental health care team. Usually, mental health care is not what is needed in the first 24–48 hours, during which life-sustaining operations are most urgent.” (Ursano, R. J., 2012)
State why this is so difficult for us to manage
To have previous knowledge of the expected needs of mental illness would be the best way to prepare when it comes to disaster preparedness. This means mental health professionals would need to work closely with medical teams to train on the signs of chronic mental illness and newly diagnosed mental illness. This would make specific behavior and triggers concerning those that might be abnormal to some require a better equipped response and to only communicate to psychological first aid in the event of those behaviors and triggers.
The difficulty with this is having the appropriate training and also a significant amount of self-care for individuals. Dealing with cases of substance abuse for someone who has never experienced this mental illness can be a concern for taking time to process feelings and keeping a open line of communication with supervisors to ensure first responders and especially volunteers are able to cope with all these new experiences with the mentally ill.
Citation
Ursano R. J. (2012). Disaster Psychiatry: Readiness, Evaluation, and Treatment. Psychiatric Services. (63)4. American Psychiatric Association. https://ps-psychiatryonline-org.ezproxy.philau.edu/doi/10.1176/appi.ps.20120p398