Are mental health Charities actually benefiting those suffering with mental issues, are they truly advocating and bringing awareness to and for them? The services and programs they provide are they truly effective?
According to Mental Health First Aid (MHFA) England individuals suffering with any type of mental are more likely to themselves and their families making them victims of violent crime due to their instability.
One of the major roles for Mental health charities is how they raise awareness, and educate communities to reduce stigma and judgement, and by doing this they allow the right conversations to be heard.
Scarlette Averley the CEO of the charity group support to recovery (S2R) located in Huddersfield spoke about what her charity does to help those going through crisis as well as recovery ‘In a nutshell we offer a range of social wellness, nature based and creative sessions supporting individuals, their families and carers to maintain and improve their physical and mental health’.
Mental health charities provide resources to support and educate individuals and their communities, not provide medical care, which might be what confuses people when they question the usefulness of charities.
Ms Averley; ‘our provision does not support counselling and therapy. We offer community activities in group settings. Where we identify that an individual may need support such as counselling, we will signpost them to appropriate services’
However, charities may give immediate support to individuals, but they are not long-term solutions to the on-going mental health crisis. Professionals will be needed to provide a sustainable recovery routine and charities might not be able to directly provide them.
Things like medication, different types of therapies, mental health facilities can be very challenging for charities to provide for many reasons funding being a major one.
Ms Averley; ‘support to recovery is not a crisis service. If an individual does come to us in crisis we direct them to appropriate services, every crisis situation is different and therefore each case is handled in a person- centered way’
Lastly as much as charities want to help and have done major things to bring more awareness, they might still lack the capability of pinpointing the major cause of mental health issues such as poverty, discrimination, lack of employment and the list goes on.