During the last 50 years, there has been a transfer of care for individuals living with mental disorders from predominately institutional settings to predominately community settings. The purpose of this research was to document the closure of Brandon Mental Health Centre (BMHC) and to look at long-term outcomes for discharged individuals. These objectives were met by interviewing key people involved in the closure and through analysis of administrative data. To support individuals after BMHC closed, new services were developed in four priority areas: adult inpatient and crisis response services, adult rehabilitation and consumer support services, psychogeriatric services, and child and adolescent services. Visits to a general practitioner for a mental disorder by individuals discharged from BMHC decreased significantly over the follow-up period while visits to a psychiatrist increased significantly. Mortality rates, physician visits, and hospital admissions were higher in former BMHC residents than in a matched cohort.

During the last 50 years, there has been a transfer of care for individuals living with mental disorders from predominately institutional settings to predominately community settings. The purpose of this research was to document the closure of Brandon Mental Health Centre (BMHC) and to look at long-term outcomes for discharged individuals. These objectives were met by interviewing key people involved in the closure and through analysis of administrative data. To support individuals after BMHC closed, new services were developed in four priority areas: adult inpatient and crisis response services, adult rehabilitation and consumer support services, psychogeriatric services, and child and adolescent services. Visits to a general practitioner for a mental disorder by individuals discharged from BMHC decreased significantly over the follow-up period while visits to a psychiatrist increased significantly. Mortality rates, physician visits, and hospital admissions were higher in former BMHC residents than in a matched cohort.

SUMMARY In the process of undertaking of health care reform, a network of ambulatory mental health centres (MHC) was created in Lithuania and legislative acts, which regulate the activity of the centres were adopted. However there is lack of data on spread, character and consumers of services, which are provided in practice in the mental health centres. Aim of the study- to analyse the structure of services, aimed at children and provided in the Mental Health Centre, and the data of children, who are applying for the help (their sex, age, the indications of their visits). Objectives:1) to determine the number and conditions of children who apply for the help to the Mental Health Centre; 2) to describe demographic structure of children who apply for the help to the Mental Health Centre; 3) to assess services provided for children with mental disorders in the Mental Health Centre. Methods: The Mental Health Centre of Kaunas Center Outpatient Department, which services about 50 000 habitants, was chosen for the research. Case-histories of 663 children from 0 to 18 years old were investigated. On the ground of visits of children, who depend to the provided district, the spread and morbidity of mental disorders was identified. Quantitative indicators of children visits to the mental health specialists were analysed. Data analysis was performed using the statistical package of SPSS 10.03. Results: In the years 2002 – 2004, 6,1 percent from all served children applied to the... [to full text]

Darbo tikslas. Įvertinti komandinio darbo svarbą bei ištirti socialinių darbuotojų vaidmenį, Kauno miesto, rajono ir apskrities, psichikos sveikatos centruose. Darbo uždaviniai: 1) įvertinti psichikos sveikatos centrų darbuotojų nuomonę apie komandinį darbą ir socialinių darbuotojų įtraukimą į jį; 2) įvertinti psichikos sveikatos centrų darbuotojų nuomonę apie socialinių darbuotojų vaidmenį ir jų atliekamas funkcijas; 3) ištirti kaip psichikos sveikatos centrų socialiniai darbuotojai vertina komandinį darbą ir savo vaidmenį jame. Tyrimo metodika. Kiekybinis tyrimas. Anoniminės anketos pagalba 2013 m. gruodžio mėn. – 2014 m. vasario mėn. buvo apklausti Kauno miesto, jo rajono ir apskrities, psichikos sveikatos centruose dirbantys specialistai. Išdalinta 110 anketų, tinkamomis analizei pripažintos 102 anketos (atsako dažnis – 77,3 proc.). Hipotezės apie dviejų požymių nepriklausomumą buvo tikrinamos naudojant Chi-kvadrato kriterijų, hipotezė apie dviejų nepriklausomų imčių proporcijų lygybę buvo tikrinama naudojant z – kriterijų. Kokybinis tyrimas. Buvo naudojamas pusiau struktūruotas interviu metodas, atlikta duomenų analizė. Buvo apklausti 6 socialiniai darbuotojai, ne trumpiau kaip 1 metus, dirbantys psichikos sveikatos centruose. Rezultatai. Komandinio darbo efektyvumą gerai vertina 50 proc. respondentų. Respondentai, kurie komandinio darbo efektyvumą vertina gerai ir puikiai dažniau nurodo, kad komandinis darbas vyksta visada arba dažnai (93,8 proc.), lyginant su... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Objective of the work. To assess the importance of the team work and to analyze the role of social workers in the mental health centres in Kaunas city, region and district. Tasks of the work: 1) to evaluate the opinion of the employees of mental health centres about the team work and involvement of social workers into it; 2) to evaluate the opinion of the employees of mental health centres about the role and functions of social workers; 3) to analyze, how the social workers of mental health centres see their team work and their role in it. Research methodology. Quantitative research. The anonymous questionnaires were used in December 2013-February 2014 to survey the specialists working in the mental health centres in Kaunas city, region and district. 110 questionnaires were distributed and 102 questionnaires were recognized as suitable for analysis (the response rate – 77.3%). The hypotheses about independence of two variables were checked using the Chi-square criterion, while the hypothesis about equal proportion of two independent samples was checked using the z criterion. Qualitative research. The semi-structured interview was used and the data were analyzed. Six social workers, who have been working in mental health centres for at least one year, were surveyed. Results. The effectiveness of team work was evaluated well by 50 % of respondents. The respondents, who evaluated the effectiveness of team work as good and excellent, indicate that the team work is carried out... [to full text]

Various community-based mental health and family agencies offer walk-in counselling services, where clients are provided with immediate access to a single session of brief therapy without appointments or referrals. Several studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of single-session therapy (SST) delivered within walk-in counselling clinics. This type of service delivery model has been found to be helpful for parents, who experience decreased hopelessness and psychological distress by increasing their confidence about their parenting. The purpose of this multiple case study was to investigate how parents perceived their parenting self-efficacy over time following a virtual single-session therapy at a children's mental health centre. Additionally, this study explored how parents perceived their overall experience utilizing this type of service delivery model. Eight mothers participated in a retrospective individual interview. Findings indicate that virtual SST provided parents with greater parental knowledge and concrete collaborative problem-solving strategies that improved parent-child interactions. Further, the emotional support received at the SST reduced parents' distress while increasing hopefulness in the parenting role. In addition, parents valued the accessibility and convenience of the virtual option. Overall, the findings of this study provide evidence that virtual SST can be beneficial for parents and can foster parental self-efficacy.

The work concerns the peculiarity of multidisciplinary team work, providing community mental health services. Theory defines the main principles of arranging the services, overview the tendency of reforms in field of psychiatry in Lithuania, propose brief development review, overlook legislation, highlighting various professional work components in the care system. The main purpose of research is to make an evaluation of Karoliniskiu mental health center’s staff and team work peculiarities parasitizing multidisciplinary team work method. Research was made using qualitative analysis, which identifies muldisciplinary team work, measures links between various professional groups. Conclusions: it is clear, that the institution has top-down (hierarchical) interactions, uneven information sharing between professional groups: psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses, social workers. Those are the main obstacles in building multidisciplinary team work in practice and equal interaction in between professionals; in case to make the treatment of patient’s problems more effective, it is necessary to enforce team work and change the information sharing system in institution – hierarchical collaboration should be changed to equal collaborating, while every professional’s competence has equal wage in general work process.

In the thesis I examine current legislative anchoring of healthcare and social care of mental health. In the second chapter of theoretical part I write about classification of mental illnesses. Third chapter, which is very important from my point of view, describe transformation of healthcare and social care in the foreign countries. Practical part contains pilot survey for the Ministry of Health. The purpose was to find out the satisfaction of the clients with social and health services, which are part of the treatment of mental health. Satisfaction was detected by questionnaires, which patients had available with their ambulant psychiatrist. Those questionnaires were created at round tables by experts, patients and service providers in a hospital. Social care and healthcare do not connect. Experts do not communicate with each other. Tragical finding was that ambulant psychiatrist has in average thirteen minutes for examination of a client. Definitely Czech Republic need Centre for Mental Healthcare for complex care of the patient.

The main goal of the Strategy for the Reform of Psychiatric Care, published in 2013 by the Ministry of Health of the Czech republic, was to improve the quality of life of people suffering from mental illness. One of the results of this strategy was the emergence of new mental health centres. These mental health centres are meant to provide individualized social and health care to people with mental illness in order to prevent or minimize their hospitalization. The service is ensured by multidisciplinary teams which include professionals such as psychiatrists, psychologists, psychiatric nurses, and social workers. Case management is supposed to be a dominant form of the service provided. The theoretical part of the thesis describes the historical context of the case management and its recent exploitation in the mental health centres in the Czech republic. The empirical part focuses on a particular multidisciplinary team applying the case management method. Through qualitative research, it aims to identify the different parts of the case management and the constraints and obstacles of its application. The analysis of the data collected brings the definition of the key problem areas the team is facing. The final part of the thesis provides recommendations for further development and proposes steps...