Evaluation of Interview on Substance Use for Mental Health

Question: Discuss about theEvaluation of Interview on Substance Use for Mental Health. Answer: Mental health workers are appointed by residential mental health centres or psychiatric hospitals and are responsible for providing efficient healthcare services, and support to respective individuals or families who experience plethora of mental issues. The primary role of mental health professionals encompasses offering counselling services and pharmacological or non-pharmacological treatment that facilitates individuals and families to deal with mental health problems (Patel 2012). Therefore, it is imperative for all mental health workers to develop an effective therapeutic relationship with all the patients and family members. Conduction of a psychological assessment assists the workers in understanding about the risk factors that increase the likelihood of suffering from mental illnesses. Co-occurring mental disorders are most commonly found in combination with substance-use disorders among individuals, who are generally subjected to psychiatric services (Becker, Luebbe and Langberg 2012). These conditions increase severity of the mental symptoms, complicate treatment and often lead to poor health outcomes of the patients. Also referred to as dual diagnosis, such conditions refer to presence of both mental illness and substance abuse. A client is reportedly diagnosed with co-occurring disorders, when at least one type of disorder is established to be independent of the other (Ruiz et al. 2012). This essay will encompass evaluation of an interview that was undertaken by the Victorian Dual Diagnosis Initiative as a training tool for mental health workers and counselors. Initial contact- Research evidences consider initial contact to be of utmost importance before an interview is conducted in the healthcare setting (Sommers-Flanagan and Bequette 2013). The aforementioned video shows that the assessor, Jess introduced herself to the patient Steve and said that she would be identifying and talking about the co-occurring mental disorder prevailing in the patient. While introducing herself to the patient, the interviewer shook her hands. Initial contact is most often assisted by adoption and portrayal of an empathetic approach that helps a person to think and visualise situations and instances from another person's perspective (Nabeel Al-Yateem 2012). The video demonstrates adoption of a formal approach with the aim of establishing initial contact with the receiver. However, there was lack of professionalism on the part of the interviewer in establishing initial contact. This could have been facilitated if she had asked Steve about his day so far, the pl ace he lives, or the food he had early in the morning. Several evidences also support the existence of a wide range of myth and stereotypes regarding mental illness among all socioeconomic sections of the society (Clement et al. 2015). This makes people living in the community discriminate those who are mentally disadvantaged, which in turn worsens the situation and acts as a barrier in the recovery process (Corrigan, Druss and Perlick 2014). Further difficulties are also associated with the fact that people suffering from mental illness often have low self-confidence and lose hope that they will be able to leave a purposeful and meaningful life (Corrigan and Rao 2012). Most mental health care services suggest that professional mental health workers should always adhere to standards of practice that makes them adopt a non-discriminating and non-judgmental style while communicating with their clients. Adoption of a non-judgmental approach helps the clients to understand that there is a willingness on the part of the workers to understand their concern (Thompson, Amatea and Thompson 2014). The video also shows that there was failure on the part of Steve to maintain proper eye contact with Jess during the interview. His restlessness is demonstrated by checking the wall clock. Asking a close-ended question on whether he had attended a mental health care service before also shows that Jess was judgmental while developing initi al contact. Rapport and respect- In order to deliver efficient mental health care services it is a professional duty of all health workers to establish an effective therapeutic relationship and rapport with their clients and family members. Rapport establishment increases likelihood of success of an intervention and enhances patient outcome (Thompson, Amatea and Thompson 2014). This is generally facilitated by effective interpersonal communication skills, which if utilised properly, help the workers to understand previous history, needs and demands of a client, and change the healthcare plan accordingly (Thompson and McCabe 2012). Jess was found to talk about the benefits that the client would receive from the service, following which she received an acknowledgement. She gave adequate time to Steve to answer her questions, without interrupting him, which suggests that she was successful in maintaining dignity and respect of the client. This gradually made him comfortable. Exhibiting adequate respect towards the autonomy and confidentiality of all patients, is another the role of mental health professionals that helps patients to identify their uniqueness (Wilson and Deane 2012). Active listening is also considered a major priority and involves providing regular feedback and listening to the speaker (Gunasekara et al. 2014). These skills were displayed by the interviewer during the entire conversation as she provided the client adequate time to respond to her questions and did not force him to answer more specifically, unless needed. Readiness to change- According to evidences relapse or recurrence of particular health disorders often bring about changes in opinion and personal habits of the concerned individual. These changes are commonly referred to as behavioural change, adoption of which helps in enhancing the health outcome and well being of all patients (Patrick and Williams 2012). Jess asked Steve whether the latter had adopted any coping strategies to deal with the co-occurring mental health concern. She also questioned him on his drinking habits, frequency of drinking, and its potential impact on his social and family life. Answering these questions made him overwhelmed and he failed to hide his disappointment. This resulted in an emotional outburst and Steve began to cry. His responses help the interviewer to understand that he was not taking proper measures for coping with the problem. However, she was successful in making him understand that all possible efforts would be taken by the mental healthcare service to help him cope with the prevailing condition. This brought about a change in his behaviour, as depicted towards the end of the video. Identification of effects of substance abuse on lifestyle and health- Several researches have been conducted that successfully established association between drug abuse, alcoholism, and their potential negative implications on family life that includes children, parents, or partners. Moreover, substance abuse also results in increasing the severity of mental disturbance and often leads to depression, hallucination or anxiety (Lander, Howsare and Byrne 2013). Hence, it is essential to understand the attitude, feelings and knowledge of a patient regarding its impact. This helps in formulating a successful recovery plan. The interviewer was able to identify the frequency of alcohol drinking and the patient's understanding of its impact on his life. His responses suggested that he had lost his driving license and was unemployed. This can be related to the fact that substance abuse often results and discrimination towards the people and creates apprehension, which leads to loss of job an d unemployment, thereby contributing to financial stress (Mizock and Mueser 2014). The questions asked also helped the interviewer to understand that Steve suffered from social isolation, after being separated from his children, spouse and the community. Although Jess was initially judgmental in her approach while talking to her client, it is quite evident that during the later part of the interview, she was able to engage in an effective conversation. Asking mixed variety of questions (both open and close-ended) helped her to retrieve maximum information about Steve. Identification of stressors- A person suffering from chronic stress experiences negative impacts on the mental and physical health. Such people find it difficult to effectively cope with stress or recover from such stressful events. Negative changes such as unemployment, or separation from family members harms mental peace (Keller et al. 2012). The interviewer tried to understand whether Steve faced any stressful events, and what were their probable impacts. She questioned him several times to understand if his financial loss or separation from kids made him adopt a suicidal ideation by taking sleeping pills. On repeated questioning, she was able to understand that there was no manifestation of suicidal tendency in the patient, and he took the pills for only curing his sleeping problem. Effective interpersonal communication skills are also considered imperative in mental health nursing, and facilitate establishment of a therapeutic relationship with the clients (Cooper et al. 2012). The interviewer that helped her in gaining his trust, which made the latter, reveal relevant information regarding his physical and mental condition, and previous family history as well, accurately demonstrated this. Maintaining calmness, direct eye contact, and reassuring the patient that he will be provided with the adequate services for coping with the persisting condition was successful. Engagement- Jess demonstrated a moderate to good level of engagement with her client. Although initially she should have adopted a more friendly approach to facilitate easy initial contact and establishment of rapport, she was later on able to gain trust of her client and make him discuss about the difficulties he was facing. The total time allotted for the interview was quite less, and can be considered as a major hindrance to effective engagement. The interviewer should have spent more time for understanding the actual needs and demands of the client in order to formulate the care plan or his appointment with the mental health worker in future. Thus, it can be concluded that good communication skills were demonstrated by the interviewer Jess, which in turn facilitated her professional duty of gathering relevant information from the client regarding the factors that might have contributed to the co-occurring mental condition. Therefore, she was able to conduct the interview with the substance-abuse patient successfully. References Becker, S.P., Luebbe, A.M. and Langberg, J.M., 2012. 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