Concept of Mental Health Workers in United Kingdom

This essay explores the history, trends and future prospects of mental health workers in the United Kingdom. It talks about the legislations guiding the mental health workers and the current scenario of the profession. The essay also examines the future trends in the mental health profession.

1
Concept of Human Services
Mental Health Workers in United Kingdom
The concept of mental health workers in the United
Kingdom, it’s history, trends and future prospects are
outlined in this essay
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Introduction
In this essay, one shall see the advent and the journey of mental health workers in
the United Kingdom. The essay will talk about how the concept of mental health
workers came into vogue, the journey that this profession has gone through. The
legislations associated with the profession and the trends along with, are also part of
the study. It will examine the current scenario and gradually try and understand the
future and the future developments of this profession. The profession of mental
health is very sensitive in terms of handling the patients and understanding their
requirements and accordingly bring them back to a healthy and happy state of mind.
History of Mental Health Workers
The concept of mental health is surrounded by a lot of controversies and varied
understandings, some of them being social stigma and ostracizing the concerned
person. United Kingdom has been the pioneer in dealing with the mental health
issues and in the 1900s the words like lunatic, insanity became popular, however,
these words were gradually replaced by “mental illness”. However, there has been
information about several private asylums that came into vogue in the early 1900s
and took care of the mental health of the patients. The concern about mental illness
dates back to the year 1247, when the first asylum in Europe was built and was
converted into a hospital in the year 1330, however, the first batch of mentally ill
patients was admitted in the year 1407. The Asylum system was stringent in terms of
their dealing with the patients and the way the patients were allowed their daily
routine. There were separate systems for men and women. Gradually in the year
1792, the institution named York Retreat, came into being, the first institution, which
dealt with the patients in a humane manner and considered them to be human
beings who needed therapeutic treatment (Turner et al. 2017).

The drive to close down mental asylums started from the 1960s and the treatment
was moved more towards “community helpers”. This process was established to
helped patients be part of the community while recovering and not segregated in
hospitals. In 1962, Mr Enoch Powell, the then Minister of Health, had put a complete
stop to the mental asylums and eventually, the number of beds in asylums had gone
down from 1,50,000 to 27000 between 1950 and 2012. A new concept called “ Care
in the community” came into being. The demise of the asylums was attributed to the
wrong ideology being used to run them. The patients survived a long sense of
hostility from the society and the benefit of the relatives through financial advantages
after their demise. The old asylums were uncaring and even brutal. However, the
concept of the “care in the community” and the end of asylums are subject to heated
debate and controversy, even in today’s world. The ‘care in the community” had
many loopholes and were recognised in the 1990s and as a result of which a further
sophisticated system was made available for the people with mental disorders
(Cockburn 2012).
At present, the mental health care comes under the hand of NHS or National Health
Services. In the year 1948, NHS was initiated and the authorities got a sudden shock
when they realised that they had to handle 100 asylums in Britain and each with their
own sets of rules, regulations and clinical practices.
Legislations Guiding the Mental Health Workers
Unlike other physical ailments, mental illness can have serious consequences for the
patient’s family or care provider, and occasionally for members of the public,
unconnected to the patient. In 1983, Mental Health Act came into being and this Act
suggested that a person can be forced to accept treatment, if they are detected with

mental illness and pose a threat to themselves or to the society. Even if these people
are capable of independent decision making. Thus, according to this law, based on
the need of the person and the risk involved in the society, intervention by others are
mandatory or legal (Zigmond 2017). This act was amended in the year 2007.
The new amended act, includes certain criteria like providing the patient with the
best of interests and as much less restriction as possible. The law is made in the
manner to provide a patient with equal respect like any other physically ill patient and
also empower the psychiatrists to do the best for the ultimate benefit and the
betterment of the patient’s mental health (legislation.gov.uk 2007).
Trends in the Profession of Mental Health
A trend of increasing number of people entering the field of psychiatry has been
increasing over the last 15 years. In today’s world, the psychiatric professionals are
advised to divert their attention more towards the recognition of psychiatric
symptoms in patients. In UK, most psychiatric treatments are now covered under the
insurance, but the recent trend shows that there is a dearth of mental health
professionals in the industry. The people with mental health issues initially consult a
GP and the GPs in turn, refer them to a Psychiatrist. According to a report by the
Care Quality Commission in 2015, one in four patients of full time GP refers to
mental health issues. But finding an equally large number of psychiatrists is a
challenge in today’s United Kingdom (Lelliott 2015).
However, a report by the Centre for Worforce Intelligence on November 2014, said
that the Consultant Psychiatrists form 4.5% of the workforce in mental health and
10.5% of the total consultant workforce of NHS in England. On an FTE basis, the
number of consulting psychiatrists has increased by more than 40%, over the last

decade. The clinical psychology staff has increased by 33%. However, both the
figures are low compared to the increase in the general number of the consultants in
NHS, which stands at 48% (Kosicka & Fitzner 2014).
Future Trends in the Mental Health Profession
Over the next 10 years, it is expected, that the society’s attitude towards the people
with mental illness shall change further in a positive way, however, this shall also
lead to the changes in the expectation of the people who use the services of mental
health workers. According to the estimation by the industry experts, in the span of
the next 10-12 years, the number of adults facing the issue of mental health will
reach approximately 2 million. Also, NHS shall be facing a gap in their funding of
about 44 – 54 billion pounds. The investment in this category is a major challenge
and a very dynamic leadership is the need of the time for building a cohesive vision
for the mental health services in the UK (Cuthbert 2015).
Demographics are constantly changing and so are the population. No matter, how
fast the technology develops, the demand continues to surge. Improvement in
treatment for patients with mental illness is on the cards and is moving at an ongoing
basis (Network 2014).
Conclusion
The general idea that has been derived from the essay, is that, the mental health
services in the United Kingdom are not going through a smooth surface and is also
bracing for some major future hiccups. The key idea is to gear up for the future and
address certain aspects which might help the future of the mental health services in
the next decade (Bhugra 2013). The industry needs to personalise the services for a

better engagement between the patients and their care providers. As a result of
which, the decision making and provision of service shall increase for the betterment
of the patients. Integration of the different parts of the mental health services and
appropriate training for the workforce in various aspects of mental health care and
allows the staff enough opportunity to move across disciplines for the purpose of
motivation.and personal development of the workforce (Cocker & Joss 2016).
Also, the services should be designed to address the mental health issues of
patients throughout the lifespan of the person. Mental Health should also be treated
as one of the core public health issues and the workforce for the issues of public
health should be trained and counselled to observe mental health as one of their
core responsibilities.

References
Bhugra, D 2013, 'The future of mental health services', Future Insight, Institute of
Psychiatry, King's College , King's College London Press, London.
Cockburn, P 2012, 'The Demise of the Asylum and the Rise of Care in the
Community', INDEPENDENT, 26 November 2012.
Cocker, F & Joss, N 2016, 'Compassion Fatigue among Healthcare, Emergency and
Community Service Workers: A Systematic Review', International Journal of
Environmental Research and Public Health, vol 13, no. 6, p. 618.
Cuthbert, BN 2015, 'Research Domain Criteria: toward future psychiatric nosologies',
Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience, vol 17, no. 1, pp. 89-97.
Kosicka, A & Fitzner, G 2014, 'In-depth review of the psychiatrist workforce - Main
report', Data and Insight, UK Department of Health, Kantar Group, The Centre for
Workforce Intelligence.
legislation.gov.uk 2007, viewed 10 March 2019,
<http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2007/12/notes/division/3>.
Lelliott, DP 2015, 'Monitoring the Mental Health Act in 2014/15', Annual Report,
Deputy Chief Inspector of Hospitals (Mental Health), Care Quality Commission,
Newcastle upon Tyne.
Network, MH 2014, NHS Confederation, viewed 10 March 2019,
<https://www.nhsconfed.org/~/media/Confederation/Files/Publications/Documents/
The_future_of_mental_health.pdf>.
Turner, J, Hayward, R, Angel, K, Fulford, B, Hall, J, Millard, C & Thomson, M 2017,
'The History of Mental Health Services in Modern England: Practitioner Memories
and the Direction of Future Research', PMC, vol 59, no. 4, pp. 599-624.
Zigmond, T 2017, 'Mental health law across the UK', BJPsych Bulletin, vol 41, no. 6,
pp. 305-307.