Core Knowledge for Mental Health Practice

CORE KNOWLEDGE FOR MENTAL HEALTH PRACTICE
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Introduction
Therapeutic intervention is an effort which is made by an individual or a group of
healthcare professionals with the aim of enhancing the well-being of individuals in the society
who are in need of help but refusing it. The intervention can be physical, psychological or
pharmacological and it may be guided or supervised by a therapist, family member or a friend
without the need of healthcare professional depending on the condition of the patient. In most
cases, intervention can take the form of a meeting between the person who is engaged in some
destructive behaviour and is resistant to help and a therapist or a family member. In cases where
the victim is not in a position of making the decision for themselves, an intervention is prepared
to act on their behalf. The method does not always work for each person. Therapeutic
interventions can be used for an individual or group of people especially in rehabilitation centres
and psychiatric treatment institutions (Dobson & Dobson, 2018). Therapeutic intervention can be
used as a tool to handle people with dementia, emotional problems, eating disorders, addictions
and harmful sexual behaviours. Therapeutic interventions are often made to try to prevent certain
known disorders which various groups of people may experience, and they do not have the
capability of helping themselves. In cases of destructive behaviours, peaceful, therapeutic
intervention is planned and organised in advance by family members, friends or healthcare
professionals (Storch et al., 2013, p.132). They then present the problem to the person with self-
destructive behaviour, they discuss the effects of their behaviors, and they give them some
options which they can apply to stop their behaviour. The concerned team should make sure that
they catch the attention of the victim to listen to them and accept what they have to offer to them.
Therapeutic intervention can sometimes involve bringing music to institutions like hospitals to

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help reduce the stress patients go through and regulate their negative emotions. This paper
focuses on narrative therapy and cognitive behavioural therapy with substance abuse.
Narrative therapy
Narrative therapy is type of counselling in which individuals are classified separately
from their problems and challenges. Narrative therapy gives the victim an opportunity to distance
himself/herself from the problem in order to be able to identify the how the issue should be of
help or harmful to them. Narrative therapy gives people the opportunity to feel more empowered
to make changes to their thoughts, and they are given a chance to be able to make their own
decision which is more beneficial especially for their health. These decisions are able to reflect
on what they are and what they are capable of doing as well as their purpose away from their
problems (An, He, Zheng & Tao, 2017, p.321). People, couples and families are all in position to
benefit from narrative therapy. Individuals who define themselves by their problems and they are
dominated by feelings such as "I am a stressed person" with the use of narrative therapy,
individuals are able to see their issues as something they have and not something which defines
and identifies who they are. According to Linehan (2018), the narrative therapist encourages
individuals by directly asking them what they prefer talking about and check if the topic is the
problem the victim is suffering from. After sometimes therapist advice the individual to share
their stories with others and tell them more positive stories from their experiences to be in a
position to recover skills which can be used to address their problems.
The objective of a narrative therapist sees that there are positive and productive ways
which can be used to approach the life and future of victims as they stop identifying themselves
with the problems they are going through. In narrative therapy, events which occur over a given
period to an individual are viewed as stories (Dobson & Dobson, 2018). These stories can be

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very significant to an individual's life while other can be very fateful than others. The meaningful
stories which an individual can get from the negative experiences shape their identity, and it
enhances their capability of making effective decisions. A narrative therapist views a victim life
full of possibilities that are just waiting for them to discover them. Narrative therapist does not
have to behave as experts when they are attending people suffering from substance abuse but
they instead have to help the victim see how they are experts regarding their own life and be able
to recover dreams, skills and values which define who they really are separate from the problems
they are experiencing in their life (Poulsen et al., 2014, 450). These are termed the buried stories
which can be rewritten and woven into the ongoing growth and future stories. The narrative
therapist should be a licensed mental health professional, social worker or a therapist who has
additional training in narrative therapy through academic programs or by merely through
continuing online education (Beutler & Clarkin, 2014). Narrative therapists should have skills,
expertise and knowledge which gives them the capability of handling victims more effectively.
Victims should feel free, safe and comfortable when working with narrative therapists.
Characteristics of narrative therapy
We all work with meaning, and we believe the purpose come from the stories which
people tell about themselves and the life events which they have experienced. Narrative therapy
should be respectful. It should respect the agency and dignity of the clients. Narrative therapy
requires that each client should be treated as an individual with no defective and not enough but
as courageous people who are capable of making their own life decisions as well as setting goals
and working hard to achieve them (Trauer, Qian, Doyle, Rajaratnam & Cunnington, 2015,
p.191). Narrative therapy should be non-blaming which means narrative therapists are not
supposed to blame clients of their problems and mistakes which they have made in life. They