One of the more unusual sights in the post-Key scramble for top jobs was that of nonentity Health Minister Jonathan Coleman putting his hat in the ring, and following up with the promise of more cash for the mental health sector.
After two years of insisting there were sufficient funds for mental health, Coleman’s claims that the Nats were on top of the issues in that sector were undone with almost his first campaign media release promising significantly increased community mental health funding.
Although he never had a show of becoming PM, his promises of extra funding for mental health and other areas of the public health (and education) sectors briefly shone a light on the funding deficit in those areas.
The truth is that both community and inpatient mental health services in the public sector are dramatically overstretched, if available at all, and recent Government denials of the need are viewed derisorily by both those who need the services, and those who work in the sector.
In the recent awful Otorohanga quadruple death, Waikato DHB mental health services patient Ross Bremner was denied critical support when his mother alerted the DSHB to his deteriorating state, and was sent back under the care of a ‘key’ worker who, from accounts I have seen, was a junior, inexperienced Occupational Therapist – not a trained mental health professional. In the whole of the Waikato rural areas, with about 2 centres outside Hamilton and nearly 200,000 population, there are only two rural mental health care teams, both of which struggle to attract and retain staff.
In a case I’m helping with at the moment, another junior Waikato DHB Occupational Therapist was tasked with deciding if a seriously ill mental health patient should have access to residential care, and when that was declined, family members were told it would be several weeks before the ill person could be re-assessed by a psychiatrist.
Another Waikato DHB patient I’m supporting at the moment had to wait 7 months before his assessment for support of a psychologist was completed; and the most recent occupancy figures for the DHB’s in-patient Henry Bennett Centre was 97% – effectively over-full.
And the word from other areas of the country is that very similar experiences are to be had almost everywhere.
So Coleman’s Road to Damascus conversion to being a champion for extra mental health funding is probably a damn good move – if only he wasn’t such a hypocrite!
Dave Macpherson is TDBs guest mental health blogger and a Waikato DHB Member
Coleman is disgusting and a complete fraud. He should resign immediately. His under funding has resulted in under staffing and as a result deaths. He is a disgrace but his ego and arrogance is his what he is about.
Coleman oversaw the funding cuts to Canterbury Mental health services funding post earthquake and now grants millions to Kaikoura. The difference, who votes National “Kaikoura”.
It would be interesting to find out what the actual nutritional value of hospital food is versus freshly prepared local food, shouldn’t be too hard to measure. Looks as if Coleman is really enjoying his hospital food?
Institutional food is not that great anywhere. I was more concerned about local jobs.
While I wouldn’t be lining up to vote for him, of the three contenders he was clearly the best. Collins “Miss Vindictive 1970” scared even the Gnats, and sans Key’s media machine a dead fish has more charisma and vastly more economic ability than Bill English. There is always the hope with an intelligent contender, however deeply buried the few surviving neurons may be, that they may wake the fuck up and begin to solve a few of the problems that the vile Key administration created and left to fester.
Any one with a medical degree who smokes, is a hypocrite!
Keep up the good work dave.
Clearly mental health is underfunded.
For me, the plight of the vulnerable is more pertinent than the behaviour of a money loving trougher.
The sad reality with mental health care and the lack of funding for essential services through the Ministry of Health is just one issue to be worried about. The government is experimenting with people suffering mental health issues, and that is to try and get them off benefits into whatever “suitable” jobs. They talk a lot about “supports”, but the actual additional supports are just more money for case managers, getting persons off benefits, hardly any extra support for needed treatment.
I know enough persons with mental health conditions, who are simply unable to get the treatment they need, so the MoH continues with simply medicating people, and that has side effects, and often does not even bring desired long-term results.
Meanwhile there is much talk about “efforts” the government makes to “help” people with mental health issues into employment, hence the Mental Health Employment Service trials, which have though proved to be ineffective.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11514141
I have been able to get more info on this, and as I was told, MSD was considering to publish a response to an OIA request online, but they have NOT done so.
So they keep sweeping the truth under the carpet, and pretend all is well with their “services” moving sick and disabled off benefits into often only precarious, temporary, part time and whatever low paid jobs.
As the earlier version, announced with some fanfare in 2013, has failed, they now try a new approach, with some minor tweaks, called ‘Work to Wellness’.
But I bet that will fail just as badly, as they allow operators like ‘In Work NZ’, ‘Workwise’ and so to experiment and try and earn high fees for questionable results.
More info on some of this:
https://nzsocialjusticeblog2013.wordpress.com/2016/08/16/senior-scientist-and-legal-experts-discredit-evidence-used-by-msd-and-dr-bratt-when-claiming-the-health-benefits-of-work/
‚In the expectation of recovery’, Faulkner, Centre for Welfare Reform, Scrib
https://www.scribd.com/doc/308613502/In-the-Expectation-of-Recovery
(criticism of biopsychosocial model, Aylward et al)
“Is the statement that if a person is off work for 70 days the chance of ever getting back to work is 35% justified?”
https://www.nzma.org.nz/journal/read-the-journal/all-issues/2010-2019/2015/vol-128-no-1425-20-november-2015/6729
Some posts with some older OIA info raising questions:
https://nzsocialjusticeblog2013.wordpress.com/2015/11/27/msds-selective-and-poor-responses-to-new-oia-requests-on-benefits-advisors-reports-mental-health-and-sole-parent-employment-services/
New, current PDF version (as on 19.09.16):
https://nzsocialjusticeblog2013.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/msds-selective-poor-responses-to-new-o-i-a-requests-post-nzsjb-upd-27-11-15.pdf
https://nzsocialjusticeblog2013.wordpress.com/2015/04/10/mental-health-and-sole-parent-employment-services-msd-withholds-o-i-a-information-that-may-prove-their-trials-a-failure/
https://nzsocialjusticeblog2013.files.wordpress.com/2016/09/mhes-spes-msd-withholds-o-i-a-info-that-may-prove-trials-a-failure-post-nzsjb-upd-fr-14-04-15.pdf
Conclusion: The government is keen to save costs, to get rid of the liabilities it faces, rather than spend extra where it is needed, to actually help people medium to longer term. That is in short their fake “investment approach”, which most voters out there have NO clue about, as they are not affected and also do not care all that much.
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