Repost from last night. Eat this, Scoop!
I haven’t made a big deal of it here, but it’s no secret that I am bipolar. Story like this one get my attention:
Criminal justice can be viewed as a numbers game. Consider these two: 15 and $157,665.
The first figure is the number of times “John,” a 44-year old St. Paul resident, has been arrested and detained in the past six years on quality-of-life crime offenses that include trespassing, urinating in public, disorderly conduct and panhandling. The second is the jaw-dropping estimated cost for John’s prosecution, incarceration and mental health services over that time from a cost analysis put together by the Ramsey County Department of Human Services.
But justice is best explained in human terms. John, county workers assure me, is a real person, a chronically homeless man who struggles with schizophrenia and cocaine addiction. His real name was not released because of medical confidentiality rules.
He is just one of the many revolving-door-type offenders constantly in and out of the criminal justice system. They are getting locked up, but not getting locked into the right kind of help that might slow down or stop that revolving door.
Which is why John and others like him are the poster children for Ramsey County’s newest “problem solving court.”
More.
No major point here, other than to point out the immense costs mental illness can have, both personally and financially.
If you need more proof, consider this: Eli Lilly will pay $690 million to settle lawsuits related to its medication Zyprexa, used to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.
And still, there are 14 states that do not mandate mental illness coverage in health care.
Can somebody please tell me what the hell is the matter with this country?
Europeans? Canadians?
Bueller?
I agree Pastor Dan, this is ridiculous. I don’t think history will look back kindly on how we as a country deal with mental health issues. Especially comments made by Tom Cruise!
Tom Cruise is a brainwashed idiot. I love how Brooke Shields has gone after him with both guns blazing. She has to. Cruise could influence a lot of people with his insane beliefs.
Dan, I’m so glad you resurrected your diary! Only a preacher could pull that off!
Ha …
I agree comepletely! It amazes me how irresponsibly some people use the spot light.
Cruise is pretty clear that Scientology has helped him to master his life, which is I guess pretty standard Scientologist belief. So the idea is that if you’re in control, you don’t need the medication.
Excuse me, but that’s a load of dangerous twaddle.
Exactly. That’s a very dangerous position to articulate on the national stage, and rather arrogant I might add, just tossing aside all the research done by neurologists.
My daughter just sent me this link to a story about how Cruise’s girlfriend is being brainwashed. Disturbing.
quite disturbing.
Don’t get me started on that moron. I just wish Brooke had a shiv, that’s all…
She surprized me, but in a good way. I’d like to make her a honorary member of the Menstruating She-devils.
I too am one of the many…er, what’s the best term, “mentally disabled” (but I’m not really disabled), “brain chemistry imbalanced” (that sounds like a better description) people out there too.
I take medications for OCD and GAD. OK, I’m not a candidate to be out on the street urinating on dumpsters, but the state of mental health care in this country is appalling. In NY State, e.g. there is no parity for treatment for mental health issues. This means that I pay $40 for my monthly psych visits, but only $15 to see my urologist. WTF?, if you’ll pardon my language.
So let’s have a bunch of poor, homeless mentally ill people running around the streets because they and we can’t afford to treat them? And then when they cause problems, lock them up?
tell them that it’s their own damn fault when they get into trouble.
BTW, I have been known to respond to parishioners telling me I’m crazy, “Yup. Certifiable. There’s a piece of paper in a doctor’s office that says so.”
Suitable for framing? I’m going to my psych tomorrow, by the way. Maybe I should ask him for mine.
What is crazy? That’s a whole other ball of beeswax or can of beans I guess. To me, I wouldn’t label someone “crazy” unless they were schizophrenic or delusional…or Republican ;^P…actually I don’t like the label crazy unless it’s meant in a joking manner…
“Political Conservatism as Motivated Social Cognition” John T. Jost, Jack Glaser, Arie W. Kruglanski & Frank J. Sulloway, 2003.
Not a certificate, but a form with a diagnosis code from the DSM-V: “bipolar II”.
And crazy is as crazy does, I always said.
I have Bipolar I disorder, moderate, most recent episode manic, with psychotic features. My costs:
Psychotherapist $100/visit (4 visits a month)
Psychiatrist %100/visit (1 visit a month)
Seroquel $20/co-pay (once a month)
Total cost: $520/month so that I can maintain enough sanity to realize just how crazy I can become.
There is no such thing as mental health parity. As an example:
Outpatient medical visits: $0 out-of-pocket.
That’s awful. And here I thought having to pay exorbitant rates for life insurance was bad…
In 1967, Gov. Ronald Reagan signed the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act (LPS), which went into effect in 1969 and quickly became a national model. Among other things, it prohibited forced medication or extended hospital stays without a judicial hearing.
A mental patient could be held for 72 hours only if he or she engaged in an act of serious violence or demonstrated a likelihood of suicide or an inability to provide their own food, shelter or clothing due to mental illness. But 72 hours was rarely enough time to stabilize someone with medication. Only in extreme cases could someone be held another two weeks for evaluation and treatment. [SF Chron, 2/18/01, via Treatment Advocacy Center.
Fast forward:
Burton said he was trying to protect the civil rights of mental patients — the 1960s argument. But to leave an untreated person wandering the streets, scrounging for food, stalking doorways for shelter — tormented all the while by hallucinations — is not an acceptable definition of freedom.
(Nice recovery Dan <smile>)
Ahhh. You beat me to it.
Not sure if you saw my response last night: I think this just goes to show how far we’ve travelled in the intervening years. These days, that bill would have been written by an HMO board behind closed doors…
I’m beginning to think insurance companies run the world. Still trying to figure how that differs from La Cosa Nostra.
but I did work for an HMO once. The stories you hear are true.
bipolar. She lives in NYS and is taken care of by SS and Catholic social services. I have no seen her in about 20 years by her choice. She couldn’t handle being so sick while the rest of us were getting married, having chilren etc…
If she could see how much we have screwed up since then she wouldn’t feel so bad.
I sometimes think of just going there to see her. But I have to respect her wishes.
That’s a hell of a combination. We will certainly keep her in our thoughts and prayers.
My heart goes out to you Teresa. I too, have a sister with severe bipolar disorder. Except I was the sole family member who stuck with her throughout my adult life, cleaning up after each and every personal tragedy and doing my best to be there for her and her children. (I’m not trying to take any glory here, I was merely doing the best I could, with limited skills.) Whenever the phone rang – whether it be at 7:00 a.m. or 3:00 a.m. I braced myself for the worst. I’m so sorry that your sister chose to go it alone, and distance herself from your family.
In my sister’s instance, she was immensely frustrated with the sluggishness from the lithium, and that it hindered her creativity (she’s tremendously gifted in many regards). In turn, she frequently went off her medication – each time creating another cycle of personal crises.
Saddest of all is the stigma. I come from a family where you simply do not discuss such things. I was most disappointed to recently discover that my parents never researched the subject. Heaven forbid, they should be seen walking out of the small town library with a book on mental illness. I do not fault them in any way, it merely saddens me that society creates such feelings.
Paul Wellstone understood. And he drafted a bill for healthcare equality for mental illness. Another reason his untimely death was so tragic.
My best to you, and my best to your sister. (I hope she has the peace and support she needs)
That’s one of my favorite Wellstone accomplishments.
Bushcho will soon be bringing you the “New Freedom Commission on Mental Health.” Think, Orwell’s “1984” meets Huxley’s “Brave New World.” There will be soma for everyone… of course it’ll cost you, because this is largely a give-away to the big pharma. Mandatory mental health screening for children… all kinds of fun stuff.
The only thing worse than discarding and incarcerating the mentally is using pscychiatry as a bludgeon to enforce social control. And it’s coming soon to a country you know.
It’s sad-the whole plan was to set up community support first, then open the state institutions. Somehow the community support system never got off the ground. Well, of course, that might take money. Not a lot, but some. So people were just set adrift with no help at all.
Now a large percentage of prisoners are the mentally ill who have no help once they’re incarcerated-and are stuck with guards who have no training in how to work with them, help them etc.
I don’t know just what is wrong with this country, withered soul syndrome along with lack of foresight? Goes right along with no preventative health care funding than ranting outrage when people who are severely ill turn out to cost the state large sums. That the preventative measures would have been much cheaper is not a part of the conversation at all.
<insert yesterday’s comments here>
Yup. We had a great conversation going. Too bad it was lost. Thanks for reposting the diary pd.
I remember working at a public library the year Reagan cut costs to the VA hospitals (in 1982 — I was in my early 20s). Within a week, we had several homeless, or marginally-housed Vietnam vets spending the day there and no longer getting their meds.
The tragedy of mental illness is that it often appears in the prime of life — hard to know how many of these vets had stress-induced illness, or just had it ‘brewing’ all along. Amazing that anyone can consider this a good cost-cutting measure!
Support the troops,indeed.
I went through a fairly severe bout of depression. I was on Prozac, but the student health insurance available through my university (the only insurance I could afford) didn’t cover ‘scripts. I went off and on the med based on when I could afford it…not the way to take the drug. It made it even more difficult to deal with what was going on, because I couldn’t gain any sense of stability–I was all over the place (someone else who had a more consistent supply even took to giving me some of their ‘script.) Once I was finally able to take the meds on a regular basis, as they should be, I was able to even out enough to deal with some issues…haven’t taken it now in 4 years, and haven’t come close to needing it. I just remember, though, how bad that period was, and how I’m still recovering from it in terms of work. It set me back a couple years.