Evaluating Mental Health Interventions for Adolescents in Australia

Adolescent mental health is a significant concern in Australia due to rising rates of depression and suicide among this age group. This essay examines psychological and pharmacological interventions aimed at mitigating these issues within the Australian context. Key strategies include Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), school-based mental health programs, and pharmacotherapy, along with public policy measures such as early detection initiatives and stigma reduction campaigns. The analysis includes a review of recent data on suicide rates among adolescents in Australia, emphasizing gender-specific trends that highlight higher risks for male youth. Furthermore, the essay evaluates the effectiveness of current interventions, referencing studies like those by Creek & Lougher (2011) and Knapp et al. (2011), which discuss occupational therapy's role and economic considerations in mental health promotion. The discussion also considers cultural factors influencing mental health perceptions and service accessibility among Australian adolescents. Concluding remarks focus on recommendations for policy enhancements, including increased funding for youth-specific programs and improved training for educators and healthcare providers to effectively address adolescent mental health needs.

Promoting mental health and
well-being
(Scenario-A)

Table of Contents
QUESTION 1...................................................................................................................................1
QUESTION 2...................................................................................................................................3
QUESTION 3...................................................................................................................................4
QUESTION 4...................................................................................................................................6
QUESTION 5...................................................................................................................................7
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

QUESTION 1
Depression and suicides are the some of the consequences of unhealthy condition of
person. According to world health organisation, the health can be defined as the state of body
with good physical, mental and well-being in the society. This defines overall the condition of
body that how a person react to particular conditions in society, how person body react to
external pathogens etc. The body is continuously controlling over the dispersion level of an
individual through hormonal balance and maintaining homoeostasis on body to regulate basic
metabolic rate of body in order to stay healthy in the social environment (Knapp, McDaid &
Parsonage, 2011). The consequences of tension and unhealthy practices like eating high
cholesterol food etc. largely affects mental health of an person to large extent.
Depression is the state of mind when a person body goes through various changes and
leads to change in mood and interest. Onset of depressive disorder can be identified through the
various inevitable changes in the body functionality like physical, mental, emotional, behavioural
changes in nature of patient. The depression most observed in the youngsters of age between 12
to 24 years. The large numbers of Australian youngsters are suffering from the depression.
Suicide can be defined as the actions or activities that is practised by an person to kill
own-self and finisher of their own life either intentionally or voluntarily. One of the major
behind the attempt to suicide is the depression and feeling of hopelessness and loneliness and
helplessness. The activities to the attempting suicide can be determining signs of the mental
illness. About 32% Australian youngsters ageing between 12 to 24 people are attempting to
suicide because of inability to fight to the problem present in society.
Depressive disorder is highly observed the children and person belonging to the age of
adolescence. At this stage the individual is not having enough maturity to tackle various problem
of life efficiently which leads to higher depression (Lamers & et. al., 2011). Before the age of 20
the Australian youngsters develop depressive disorder in Australia which counts for around 25%
of the youngsters and about 50% of youngsters are suffering form depression before the age of
30 years. About 13.5% of the children and youngsters belonging to the age group of 12 to 24 are
suffering from the mental disorder of depression which is having responsibility of an nursing
assistance to promote healthy lives in the Australia to serve better life to youth of country. The
reason behind the development of depressive disorder in behaviour of person is can be genetic
vulnerability i.e. it counts for 30 to 50% of depression cases are suffering practices of this
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respective reason of heritability of depression during the developmental stage of adolescence in
youngsters. This can be defined as the children are facing problems of the depression because his
parents are going through many problems in life and this increases the changes of inheritance of
depression to their children for about 3 to 4 times. Other reason behind the depression can be
stressed events of life, Chronological relationships and because of bullying and peer victimising.
There are many communities in Australia they are attempting to the suicide because of
different reasons. The reasons for suicidal attempt can be mental illness, depression etc. This
have large differences in the trends of suicidal attempts in differences in gender in Australia.
Suicidal attempts are showing higher rate in male as compared to the women of Australia. Male
to female suicide ratio in 1960s was about 2:1. This states at after every 2 attempts by male one
female is trying to attempt suicide in country (Facts and stats about suicide in Australia. 2014).
This ratio keep on increasing as the years are pasting. It comes to 4:1 in 1970s. In 2000 it was an
relaxing era for the suicidal attempts for the country as the gender suicidal attempt ratio
decreases to 3:1. The male are practising the suicidal attempt through various means like hanging
own body, with helps of poison etc. about 58.8% of the attempts to silicide are followed by
hanging among males of Australia in 2015. While the female are using more poisons which is
observed about 28% of women is following this method to commit suicide as concerned to the
male i.e. only 10% of men are using this method for suicidal attempt. In 2015 it is observed that
2.8% male dies because of suicide attempts while this numbers for female is only to 0.9% death.
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QUESTION 2
In this respective case scenario Jonathon is suffering from the depression and attempt to
suicide. Depression is an risks and concerns to the mental illness which may develop suicidal
thoughts by individual (Lorenc & et. al., 2012). So, this should be managed effectively by
nursing practitioner in order to helping sufferer of depression an better and healthy life. Various
factors that may develop mental health concern which are life events, peer victimisation, genetic
vulnerability etc. The nurse of Midwifery examined that Jonathon has taken overdose of drugs.
Jonathon was also failed in maintaining good healthy love relationship with his girlfriend. The
19 years child Jonathon is also very much close to his dad but after death of his mother there
arises some distances and differences in the relationship with his father because the his dad is
busy in earning money for living his children better lives. The reason behind the depression and
the attempt to suicide is defined below.
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Source 1: (Insight into men's suicide. 2017)

1st Factor: Stressful events- In present scenario the Jonathon is having great attunement
with his mother who passed away 12 months before. This was an stressful event for the
individual which leads to development of depression and he tries to commit suicide. Another
condition is Jonathon is in 1 year relationship with Leah and due to stressful condition in home
he is not able to maintain good relationship with Leah due to which the relationship is going to
finish which is also an stressful situation for the Jonathon.
2nd Factor: Family relationship- The individual of 19 years Jonathon is highly connected
with his father and having good relationship. But after death of his mother dad is busy in
working most of the time and there is no one to support the mental health and emotions of the
Jonathon which leads to an depression and deeper through and development of feeling helpless
which forces to attempt for suicide.
Other situation which increases depression of Jonathon are instability to submit
assignment in school on time, lower interest to attend school and classes of learning, higher
dependency to the alcohol and other stressful conditions in life and work tension etc. The
Jonathon is suffering from depression and low mood because of unavailability of the finance
resource. This largely affects an individual mood and interest. Another reason for development
of depression by Jonathon can be isolation nature from the society, school environment, from
workplace. House worries also contributes largely to the depression of patient and may leads to
suicidal attempts by sufferer.
The bereavement is an state of mind and depression, grief after a huge loss like death of
loved once or the fear from getting apart form the special person in life. This is an state of mind
which leads to higher grief and depression and sometimes this leads to attempts to suicide. So,
person should counter these bereavement conditions with calm nature and consolidate the
actions and behaviour.
QUESTION 3
There are various type of risks associated with the depression and mental disorders which
have to managed by the nursing staff of the heath care organisation. These risk are defined as
follows:
Self-harm: The nursing staff should take care of Risks associated with the self harm
which defined the patient may harm himself because of illness. In this particular case the
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Jonathon because of depression he attempt to suicide and tries to harm himself in the conditions
of drunk.
Attempts to suicide: Another risk is attempt to suicide, the patient may be physical
harmed by himself because of mental illness. Jonathon attempts to suicide because of his
inability to maintaining an successful good relationship with his girlfriend and also not bale to
save his mother and he is feeling hopeless to live better life.
Self and others reputation: There may be an risk associated with the mental disorder is
risk of reputation of himself to others also this is the another risk which also affects the
confidence level of the Jonathon and showing less interest to going to hospital to take proper
treatment of his depression.
Self-neglect: There may be another risk associated with illness which is risk of self
neglect which defines that sufferer may neglect his self existence and care also. This is an major
risk which Jonathon may develop that he start neglecting himself and showing low mood and
lower interest in social activities and extract himself form external interaction.
There should be ethical and legal practices maintained in the working environment of the
organisation working for the treating mental illness of the society people in Australia. The
professional practitioners should be abide with the legislations defined in the mental health act
of 1983 and different amendments in 2008. In order to implement ethical actions in practise
following are the some aspects which are to be take care by the nursing staff of midwifery in the
respective depression case of patient Jonathon is defined below.
Beneficence: According to Creek & Lougher (2011) these are the actions and activities
that rare carried out by the person or an medical profession or nurse in order to helps other and
for others benefits. In the medical professional nurse and professional are continuously engaged
in delivering better helps to the sufferer to serve them better healthy life. In this case the nurse of
Jonathon provides an goods assessment to the patient in emergency conditions and assist
different medical stets to identify problem.
Non maleficence: This concepts of ethical action can be defied as doing no harm to the
others. The professional and nurse are continuously examining the treatment and then conclude
dome time to stop medication because it is effectiveness an may cause some harm to patient
body (Joe Herbert M.B, Ph.D., 2016). In this particular Non maleficence the nurse suggest to
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stop drinking and taking overdose of medicines to Jonathon is an ethical action following non
maleficence in actions.
Mental Health Act 2008: As per view of Dix & et. al., (2012) this is the legislation
introduced by the Australian government in order to legalise the process of treating mental
illness professionally. This follows various principles of defining guidelines and principles to
responsibilities of practitioners and nursing staff, patient rights to avail effective treatment and
various admission and detention policies. In this particular scenario of Jonathon, his father take
Jonathon to emergency which this act states that the patient in emergency should be assisted as
soon as possible by nursing staff.
In this particular case the Jonathon because of depression he attempt to suicide and tries
to harm himself in the conditions of drunk. Jonathon attempts to suicide because of his inability
to maintaining an successful good relationship with his girlfriend and also not bale to save his
mother and he is feeling hopeless to live better life. This is an major risk which Jonathon may
develop that he start neglecting himself and showing low mood and lower interest in social
activities and extract himself form external interaction.
QUESTION 4
In this present scenario the Jonathon is 19 years old child who is suffering from the
depression and has taken overdose of the medicinal drugs which was an attempt to suicide. This
is an emergency situation and the nursing practitioner should follow the relevant intervention on
the priority and urgent basis of mental illness risk. As this is the situation of emergency where
the life of patient is at risk. Following are the actions which can be carried out by an practitioner
are defined like assessing the problem, examining the method used to suicide and the examining
the body through various physiological tests.
In this particular case Jonathon nurse assist the patient in emergency and its medical
examination revelled that he is taken overdose of drugs and drunk 6 strong beers which leads to
semi-conscious conditions.
Another action will be providing an medicines which will helps in reducing the risk of
health and effectively testing the problem.
The various nursing intervention that are to be considered while assessing any patent in
are the nursing relationship with the sufferer of the depression. The nurse should be responsive
towards the patient illness and provide hope to live through communicating with effective and
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domestic language which will provide more sympathy to the sufferer and shows faster recovery.
The patient of mental disorder and depression should be provided with the psycho education in
order to deal with the illness effectively. Nursing should assess various risk associated with the
mental disorder and responsibly assess the disease.
QUESTION 5
In this particular case the Jonathon is suffering from depression because of stressful life
events and development of gap between him and his father which results in emotionally
weakness of patient. After handling the problem of emergency the practitioner should act calmly
and take care for patient for further intervention action which are defined below.
The staff should assist the other problem and symptoms of the body which ate developed
due to longer time period of depression like physical body illness, behavioural changes and
chronological changes in working (Weare & Nind, 2011).
Another action of staff will be provide an proper assessment and care to Jonathon in
order to provide him mental support for recovery and helps him to become strong to fight with
the critical condition in life and not to try to attempting suicide.
DSM is the tool used by the nursing assessment of the disease related to the mental
disorder. It defines various diagnostic tools and approaches and develop an statistical manual
about the illnesses and problems of the patient suffering from the mental disorder to depression.
The is known as Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorder.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journal
Creek, J & Lougher, L. (2011). Occupational therapy and mental health. Elsevier Health
Sciences.
Dix, K. L & et. al., (2012). Implementation quality of whole‐school mental health promotion and
students’ academic performance. Child and adolescent mental health. 17(1). 45-51.
Kieling, C & et. al., (2011). Child and adolescent mental health worldwide: evidence for action.
The Lancet. 378(9801). 1515-1525.
Knapp, M., McDaid, D & Parsonage, M. (2011). Mental health promotion and mental illness
prevention: The economic case.
Lamers, S & et. al., (2011). Evaluating the psychometric properties of the mental health
continuum‐short form (MHC‐SF). Journal of clinical psychology. 67(1). 99-110.
Lorenc, T & et. al., (2012). Crime, fear of crime, environment, and mental health and wellbeing:
mapping review of theories and causal pathways. Health & place. 18(4). 757-765.
Weare, K & Nind, M. (2011). Mental health promotion and problem prevention in schools: what
does the evidence say?. Health promotion international. 26(suppl_1). i29-i69.
Online
Facts and stats about suicide in Australia. 2014. [Online]. Available through:
<http://www.mindframe-media.info/for-media/reporting-suicide/facts-and-stats>.
[Accessed on 23rd August 2017].
Insight into men's suicide. 2017. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.psychology.org.au/inpsych/2012/august/beaton/>. [Accessed on 23rd
August 2017].
Joe Herbert M.B, Ph.D. 2016. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/hormones-and-the-brain/201604/depression-
is-risk-alzheimer-s-we-need-know-why>. [Accessed on 23rd August 2017].
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