Going Sane: A Commentary on Contemporary Mental Health Regulations

In the film Going Sane, directed by Sabey (2017), we see how the mental health system in America is fractured and witness some of the challenges parents face when trying to get their children the best care for mental health concerns.

Based on the film, there are several trends that we are seeing in mental health today. For one, the number of mental health diagnoses increases each year despite that the number of mental health professionals has also been increasing. There has been continued increases of monetary investments into the mental health facility, including requiring insurance to cover more mental health treatments.

The difference between how the medical field handles evidence-based practice and how the mental health field handles evidence-based practice is largely that the mental health field does not have the requirements for effectiveness of treatments that the medical field does. Specifically, a treatment cannot be used in the medical field until it is proven effective whereas a treatment can be used in the mental health field “until they are proven dangerous” (13:57). Medicine has clear protocols nationally, but mental health treatments do not.

In October of 2015, HIPPA was evaluated to see if confidentiality laws were the issue in lack of parental involvement in youth treatment, but ultimately people found that there has actually been an outdated trend in mental health to exclude parents from treatment. This has been linked to parent-blame and the belief that excluding parents will be better for the youth, but in fact this has had a negative impact on treatment outcomes. If mental health professionals move to involve parents by encouraging family therapy and increasing involvement of parents in their youths’ individual treatment, then there will be a positive impact in treatment by involving the youths’ social environment in treatment plans and fostering familial support.

Some children/adolescents are not receiving evidence-based treatment because not all providers practice EBT and not all parents are educated in choosing which professionals offer evidence-based treatment. Even if the advertisements of the treatment facility boast “evidence-based practice,” that does not guarantee that providers actually practice according to research guidelines. Additionally, several mental health jobs, such as addictions counselors, do not require intensive training and are unregulated, so low-qualified personnel are in positions to treat people, which decreases the likelihood that the personnel will administer EBT. In short, mental health treatments are largely unregulated and vary from state to state, which decreases the likelihood that a child or adolescent will receive evidence-based treatment.

Reference

Sabey, J. (Director). (2017). Going Sane [Video file]. Parents-to-Parents Films. Retrieved January 3, 2021, from Kanopy.