Forced medication in mental health Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 3000 words

Forced medication in mental health - Essay Example Scholars in the nursing professions have emphasized the inconsistency and contradiction between forced medication or involuntary treatment and components of professional ethical guidelines. Ethical codes usually require freewill or constraint in the part of clients only when threat is probable and imminent. Other scholars firmly oppose this observed contradiction between nursing principles and involuntary treatment; they refer to the right of clients to treatment, not only his/her right to say no to medication, as an essential matter (Freckelton & Lesser, 2003). Yet others argue that taking a stand in this debate draws away the attention of mental health professionals from more crucial issues about the quality of mental health services. Judgments aside, for a large number of mental health professionals, exercising involuntary treatments or forcible medications has become an essential part of their professional obligations. These professionals may frequently admit clients under involu ntary directives or assist court orders for outpatient treatment and medication (Hayes et al., 2007). Numerous professionals are now confronted with the challenge of discussing complicated and problematic decisions with clients who pursue treatment under court orders. Similarly, because forced medication for mental disorder is perhaps as persistent as mental disorder itself, numerous mental health clients with severe and chronic mental disorders will undergo such medication over the course of their disorder (Freckelton & Lesser, 2003). Usually, forced mental health procedures may be given as a ‘crisis stabilization’ type of hospitalization in case of probable threat to the client or to others (Shally-Jensen, 2013, 369). Several states are increasingly implementing outpatient authorized treatment that preferably administers ‘assisted treatment’ (Shally-Jensen, 2013, 369) with additional resources and further implications if treatment procedures are not follo wed. Moral and Ethical Issues of Forced Medication in Mental Health Care Mental disorder can be a dreadful misfortune affecting not just the patient but family members, communities, and the society as well. Numerous mentally ill individuals do not have the capacity to take care of or protect themselves, and they could be a threat to themselves or others. In Canada, custodians or substitutes should make treatment decisions for them. Making treatment decisions for those who have mental disorders raises several moral, ethical, and legal issues (Swartz & Swanson, 2004). Several of the disturbing questions are as follows (Devettere, 2010, 111): Is it moral to place the mentally ill in institutions against their will simply because they might harm themselves or others? Is it moral to force treatment on them, most especially drugs or surgery or shock treatments, against their will? Is their informed consent for treatment truly voluntary if we have made it clear to them that they will be co nfined to an institution if they do not accept the treatment? Mental disorder is an ambiguously defined concept. It includes a broad array of disorder from the fairly mild to severe, and the classifications applied by the American Psychiatric Association are quite broad that health care professionals have great latitude in making a diagnosis of patients’ behavioral patterns (Devettere, 2010, 111). This makes it particularly crucial to take into account the ethical or moral repercussions of involuntary treatment or forced

Assistive Technology Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Assistive Technology - Essay Example This paper is meant to assist local school system educators and administrators of Clark County School District in assessing the best type of assistive technology that will meet the needs of the district. Apart from that, this paper will also dwell on how the technology will be sold among other factors of successfully incorporating the technology in learning institutions. As of 2011, the Clark County School District was the 5th leading school county in the U.S. It caters for the whole Clark County and Nevada along with cities such as Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, Mesquite, Henderson and Boulder City. The system also incorporates the census-designated places of Blue Diamond, Laughlin, Bunkerville, Logandale, Goodsprings, Mount Charleston, Indian Springs, Searchlight, Sandy Valley and Moapa. The district is split into seven regions, and it also operates 25 Programs and Alternative Schools (Richmond, 2012). The district has partial association with charter institutions, and, with the exemp tion of offering some transport service, does not have any association with the private schooling institutions in the county. The school district started in 1956 when the Nevada governing body ordered consolidation of each and every state school district into 17 region school districts. This amend confirmed that 14 separate school districts in the county would become elements of the fresh Clark County School District (Richmond, 2012). Owing to the lofty number of households migrating into the Las Vegas region, the school district experienced remarkable growth in learner enrollment from the 90s to the late 2007. Many bond issues were accepted by the supporters to assist the district cope with this growth and development. This led to the creation of new schools. From then, 2007, as many as 16 schooling institutions have been opened. This has led to an expected and also high demand for educators to teach the rising number of students (Richmond, 2012). Due to this, the county had to be innovative in locating educators to hire. They also have to be creative in recruiting educators from other countries or states within the United States. The statewide financial calamity, since 2008, has affected the School District of Clark County. The county has witnessed a decrease in the number of learners and is experiencing budgetary deficits. At the 2010 United States population census, there were 1,951,269 individuals living in Clark County, a raise of 41.8 percent since 2000. The ethnic makeup of the populace was: 10.5% Black, 48.0% Non-Hispanic white (60.9% White), 0.7% Alaska Native and American Indian, 8.7% Asian, 0.7% Native Hawaiian, as well as other Pacific Islander, and 5.1% from other races. The remaining 29.1%, on the other hand, were Hispanics of any race (Richmond, 2012). In 2009, the U.S. Census Bureau projected the population for Las Vegas Metropolitan Area to be at 1,902,834. The region was rated as one of the fastest growing and developing in the United States . 3.1% of the citizens in the county live with disabilities. A majority of these disabled people use wheelchairs to move around (Richmond, 2012). It is, therefore, vital for these individuals to come up with ways of incorporating the people with disabilities into their educational system in order for them also to be competitive in today’s labor market. Therefore, the type of assistive technology that this county needs is wheelchairs for their disabled citizens and