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THE MAJORITY OF Dáil members believe that the provision and funding of mental health services should be made a priority over the next three years, according to a new survey from Millward Brown Lansdowne.
Today marks World Mental Health Day, which aims to raise awareness about mental health issues and help to fight the stigma relating to depression.
The survey shows the majority of TDs believe that delivering community mental health services (63 per cent) and increasing funding (59 per cent) should be “top priorities” if the country is serious about improving mental health services over the next three years.
The survey contains responses from nearly half of Dáil members (71 out of 166) and reveals that 56 per cent of politicians surveyed see the topic of mental health raised ‘very often’ or ‘frequently’ within their constituency clinics – a significant increase from the 27 per cent reported last year.
The emphasis on improving mental health services is also reflected in a nationally representative survey run at a similar time, which found that more than two-thirds of the public (68 per cent) believe that the importance of mental health services needs to be focused upon over the next three years.
Deputy Simon Harris, one of co-convenors of the the Oireachtas Cross Party Group on Mental Health, said there is “a clear appetite” for improvement in our mental health services from politicians, regardless of their political affiliation. “We owe it to our constituents to ensure we don’t forget how crucial this issue for everyone, even among all the difficult budget decisions that will be made this Dáil term,” he said.
The survey, commissioned by the One Foundation, also revealed:
Political view
Public views
Meanwhile, a senior psychologist has spoken out about the need to pay particular attention to young people’s mental health.
Dr Michele Coyle, a senior clinical psychologist at Saint John of God Hospital Stillorgan in Dublin, says the symptoms of depression in young people can vary. She said that while many adolescents display low mood similar to adults who are depressed, adolescent depression may also be masked by anger and acting out behaviours.
Signs can include:
Coyle recommends the following advice for helping young people who are depressed:
For information or support on mental health and suicide, contact the following organisations:
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I suffer from serious anxiety and depression. I used to work but it pushed me to despair so I lost due to illness the job of nearly ten years I held. It was building up for a long time and i drank to cope but the drinking got out of hand. Thanks to the AA I was able to stop drinking. I am a patient in a day hospital and have been since 2011 while being treated by my gp since 2009 for the same complaint. I have good days and bad days. I don’t go out much. I get stressed very easily and have medication to control it. I also am trying to attend stress management classes. The worst part is I was turned down for my social welfare payment. Even though i worked all my life and have letters from my GP and Consultant Psychiatrist stating I have this illness and that it will require lifelong treatment. I am so worried. I was refused and have to now wait for an appeal. There isn’t a day i am not in hell with stress and worry. I dread the postman and just don’t open the letters until I have taken my medication because if it is more bad news I am afraid of what it will do. I am afraid of losing control and harming myself in despair. I cannot cope with the daily stress and waiting for months. I don’t know who else to turn to. I have rang the samaritans a few times at my lowest. The waiting and uncertainty of the appeal is eating away at my nerves and i can’t stop thinking about being rejected again. This is typical me. The thoughts keep going round and round and its torture. I see the psychiatrist about once every two months for about 5 minutes and thats it. The staff are very nice and they do what they can but cutting their budget is going to make my life more unbearable. I just wanted to share how i feel as a person dependant on mental Health Services.
@Christopher, thank you for sharing your story, it can’t have been easy, I can almost feel your pain. I hope someone reading this can offer you good advice in sorting out your payments. Keep strong and persevere, your in my thoughts.
Thanks Deirdre. I hope someone can. Just so confused about it all.
@Christopher,
Credit to you for telling your story like that. It takes courage to do that. I hope things work out for you, and you can keep it in the day as best you can. Wishing you well.
Thank you Rommel. I went to a local councillor to ask them to help me with the appeal. I’m just at my wits end now with it all. I have got all the letters i can get from health professionals and I honestly don’t know what more they want.
Just for the record. It is beyond me how anyone could give me a red thumb for having the courage to speak the truth from the heart about Mental Illness. many men do not speak out about mental illness and i was trying to break this trend. Whoever did red thumb the comment all I can say is you must be very heartless cold people and be careful. Some day you might just have a mental illness yourself and I hope when you do you don’t meet people like yourselves. Heartless.
To be fair Christopher the red thumbs could be done by accident. It has happened to me a couple of times with my fat fingers. It really does not matter anyway as the reponse to your honesty is really positive. I myself suffer from bi polar disorder & the support from the people everyday is truely inspiring. Even people on here that I have never met. Its good to see people in difficulty being able to express themselves & getting support even from strangers. I commend you on your honesty & want you to know you are among people with the same battle as your own.
Politicians tell group they support them.
They’d give the same response if the survey was on behalf of the IFA for agricultural grants or to builders groups on Section 32 tax breaks.
Politicians are “yes men” (even the women!).when it comes to things like this because it gets them a few votes. Answering a survey is completely different to actually putting the money in place.
Don’t hold your breath waiting for it to happen.
We simply MUST push our TDs and Government to take decisive action.
We see above that everybody wants training in how to look after your mental health to be available to young people in schools. We know that young people in surveys themselves consistently ask for this.
We know that there is a huge crisis in youth mental health and the level of suicide among this age group is appalling and shocking.
I suggest that anybody reading this does the following:
–Sign the Mental Health Reform petition to make sure the Government keeps to its commitment to reform our mental health system and also to keep €35m it promised to ring-fence for community mental health services http://www.mentalhealthreform.ie/petition2012.php. We need to move to a focus on promoting mental health positively…and a whole community approach…
–Get onto your TD and tell them you want the Government to spend MORE on mental health, and perhaps especially youth mental health, and that young people and adults overwhelmingly want youth mental health programme in ALL schools available to ALL young people – and NOT in five years’ time, but as soon as possible… This report on youth mental health makes clear that School, ExamsYou can get their emails from http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/about/contact/ or from tomorrow there is a new interactive site where we can all talk to our TDs and it will keep the issues raised up there on the site for all to see: http://www.dailwatch.ie.
–Read this major report on Irish youth mental health and look at chart on page 29, which shows the huge percentage of stress that our young people experience related to school (the Education, Exams, Homework and Tests columns together add up to a high percentage). It’s not good enough! If the recommendations in this article above are acted on we will have proper programmes on positive mental health for all students and also for all teachers, so we can make schools happier places, rather than places of such stress for our young people. http://www.headstrong.ie/sites/default/files/My%20World%20Survey%202012%20Online.pdf
–Listen to young people and ask your TDs and children’s schools to listen to young people – say with workshops or surveys for ALL students about what they like or don’t like about their learning environment, what causes them stress and unhappiness and get them involved in making things better.
Tell your TDs you want the Government to spend more on mental health, and perhaps especially youth mental health, and that young people and adults want youth mental health programmes available to all young people in schools as soon as possible… from tomorrow there is a new interactive site where we can all talk to our TDs and it will keep the issues raised up there on the site for all to see: http://www.dailwatch.ie.
Sign the Mental Health Reform petition to make sure the Government keeps to its commitment to reform our mental health system and ring fence funding for community mental health services http://www.mentalhealthreform.ie/petition2012.php.
Read page 29 of this report, which shows education is the highest stressor in young people’e lives by a long shot (Education, Exams, Homework and Tests columns together). It’s not good enough! We need proper programmes on positive mental health for all students and all teachers, so we can make schools happier places, rather than places of such stress for our young people. A majority of adults and young people want this. http://www.headstrong.ie/sites/default/files/My%20World%20Survey%202012%20Online.pdf
“Virtually any school activity that subjects children to pressure or makes them feel uncomfortable is now diagnosed as the potential cause of a mental health problem… The diseasing of the school experience has gained such formidable dynamic that the idea of “forcing” students to do anything is often catogorized as form on emotional abuse.”
Written by Frank Furedi, professor of sociogy at the University of Kent. I don’t know how anyone can suggest that education damages mental health with a straight face.
Furedi goes on, “a child’s psychology tends to be active and creative. It is up to educators to stimulate it with knowledge rather than render it passive with therapy.” This last point is extremely relevant to the path education seems to be going down in Ireland.
He would be in a minority there Ellen. It is well documented that a friendly, engaging, relaxed learning environment that prioritises the welfare of students and student teacher relationshis has better outcomes both in terms of student happiness and academic outcomes. Finland has among the highest PISA scores for literacy,numeracy and science in the world and they reformed their education system to prioritise relaxed learning environments without testing and exams,where student teacher relationships, the involvement of students in designing and assessing their own learning,and student happiness are paramount. Our education system where young people are not engaged as active learners in their own learning and spend so much time learning by rote for pointless exams only puts stress on them, and universities complain that undergraduates that come to them cannot think for themselves and are incapable of creative thought. So if we have a system that young people, who live in a much more stimulating multi-media environment, find boring, irrelevant and stressful,and employers and universities criticise as not preparing them for further study or work, should we not reform it. And if young people feel they are suffering from stress and depression,and one young person a month is committing suicide, should we not use school to help them learn how to look after their mental health as other countries do. If you do not think either that education can have a bad effect on a person’s mental health, then perhaps you are labouring under the old model with a division between well and mentally ill – that’s not how we look at people any more.
Why have I not been able to post – is there some problem?
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