Mental Health Disorder

Running head: MENTAL HEALTH
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Title: Mental Health Disorder

MENTAL HEALTH
According to Bertolote (2009), the origin of mental health can be tracked since the
invention and development of public health. Mental health as a word could be found in the
English dictionary even before the 20th century but mental health as a discipline found in
1946, during an International Health Conference in the New York, where the WHO and the
Mental Health Association were founded. Before the founding of mental health there existed
the concept of “mental hygiene” which first came in to existence in the 1843 in a book titled
designed to explain on health and duration of life. In 1950, in WHO congress, the definition
of mental health and mental hygiene were nailed. Mental hygiene was described as any
activity or technique focusing on maintaining and encouraging mental health. Mental health
was defined as a condition affected by both social and biological factors, causing its
fluctuation and makes one attain their instinctive and conflicting drive so as to maintain peace
with others and bring a positive change in their physical and social environments.
Thirunavurakusu, Thirunavukarasu and Bhugra (2011) define mental health as one’s
behavioural, emotional and cognitive health. This term could also be used to mean the
absence of mental health. Mental health affects one’s day to day life, physical activity and
even their relationship with the environment. A person with a good mental health, they have
the ability to enjoy life and achieve an equilibrium between life struggles and activities,
therefore achieving psychological resilience. Thirunavurakusu et al. (2011) claim that mental
health and mental wellbeing are an integral part in having a satisfactory, happy and
meaningful life. Researcher and health care professionals are working hard so as improve the
mental health patients, though their attempt has been met by different setbacks. These
obstacles have been as a result as poor understanding and lack of mind medical
conceptualization. The understanding of human brain by health care professional has been
affected by different vested interests as a result of the mental health conceptualization having
implications which reach far domain s such as religion, politics, social and personal lives, law

MENTAL HEALTH
and the state policy. This definitely led to troubles in the psychiatric diagnosis and stigma in
the practice. There is a need by health care professionals, according to Thirunavukarasu
(2011) to conceptualize mind and mental health if they are to be honest in their study and
promotion of mind and mental health in the society. This mental conceptualization would
also be important in removing the existing stigma and confusion associated with psychiatric
illness and activities. Thirunavukarasu suggested a utilitarian mental health concept with its
core concept being conceptualizing mental health. This was termed as manas so as eliminate
the existing misconceptions and beliefs about the mind. The current mind and mental concept
are as a result of the existing Cartesian medicine concept that recognizes the mind as a
platform that the body interacts with.
Manas is a combination of 3 different components, including thought, intellect and
mood, with each existing in every manas at all times. The mood comprises of what is being
felt by an individual, the thought is all that which one is thinking and the intellect includes
one’s computational activities. Everyone has only one manas which ceases to exist when the
person’s existence is terminated. The manas cannot affect anything that it does not form a
part of and still nothing can directly affect the manas unless it forms part of the manas. The
manas controls the behaviours and if not affected then the condition cannot be considered
psychiatric (Roberts, 2018). The manas health state is called mental health. Manas can be
considered as an attribute of self just like the body.
According to Nordqvist (2017), everybody is at a risk of contracting mental health
issues regardless of their age, gender, social status and ethnicity. Research shows that 18.5
percent of the Americans are reported with mental health complications, with more than 9.8
million adults associated with mental health issues in 2015. The most common mental
illnesses include mood, anxiety and schizophrenia disorders. Anxiety, which is the common
mental disorder is due to severe fear of certain things or conditions. People having this

MENTAL HEALTH
disorder try to distance themselves with the anxiety triggers. Graham (2010) thinks panic
disorder, phobias, post-traumatic stress disorder and obsessive compulsive disorder are some
examples of anxiety disorder. Mood, affective or depressive disorders are characterized by
sudden changes in moods. Examples include bipolar disorder, major disorders, seasonal
affective disorders and persistent depressive disorder. Schizophrenia is a complex mental
disorder which attacks an individual between the age of 15 and 25. The victim has
fragmented thoughts and faces difficulties in processing information. This disorder has both
positive and negative symptoms. The positive ones include hallucinations, thinking disorders
and delusions while the negative ones include flat moods, absence of motivation and
withdrawal.
The early signs and symptoms of mental disorder includes withdrawal from people
and things that previously mattered to an individual, differences in one’s eating and sleeping
habits, uncharacteristic emotions, confusion, delusions, thought of harming oneself, inability
to complete tasks and hallucination (Silvanus & Subramanian, 2012). There exists different
ways to treat mental health disorders. A method used in treating a certain mental health
disorder may not apply to another victim with the same disorder. Some treatments are more
effective when combined in treating a certain disorder. Some of the strategies taken to treat
mental illnesses include psychotherapy medications and self-help.
There also exist theories that claim that mental health could be affected by life style
factors (Young, 2014). Among these are exercise and body activity. Exercise does not only
control body weight and protecting the physical health of an individual but it could be
effective in treating and preventing mental health issues. Exercise is also important in
reducing muscle pain. There is no measurable amount of exercise considered to cure mental
health but frequent exercise helps improve one’s moods. In the past, therapist could not find
and correlation between smoking and mental health and therefore did not pressure their