Forum; Dr. King Davis: A Mental Health Report Card

from the longhorn radio network the university of texas at austin this is for him it was much more so much more there cain gave a professor of social policy at the school social work at virginia commonwealth university in richmond virginia a lot of people don't see people from the hot prawns a lot of people praying on people meditate lot of people talked to someone to their close to and their families the mother grandmother grandfather talk to a person in your school or different places in and do reasonably well with certain kinds of discomfort emotionally this

is a trio formed guest dr king e davis delivered the rapidly sutherland lecturer at the school social work at the university of texas at austin dr davis has held various positions of leadership in the mental health field from nineteen ninety to nineteen ninety four he was the commissioner of the virginia department of mental health mental retardation and substance abuse in our interview he addressed the current conditions that affected mental health policy who is it that we have decided that we will allow to make policy for us as a society and this subject the same people that make policies seen every other year old people make policy for young people don't make policy for when whites make policy for blacks the richmond policy for the poor jessica someone has conceded this authority or expand conferred upon that it's the structure of our of our government system state legislatures in every statement the policies that govern ali no no single health care who can practice state interest commissions and make the same decisions

around all varieties indian forms of care and care delivery systems and the light and it's not much different terms of composition from one state and so we've gotten past the point we're we wonder can we trust these guys will people operate for the most part on what they know what they think they now that's changing to some extent in my time period in virginia for example i have lots of opportunities to orient the legislature around the health care problems the policies that we felt that we needed but it's it's a legislative process to some extent us too what the policies are of that are going to be developed and implemented in a community or industry when they did this do they take into consideration that the people affected include many more than simply those needing treatment sure in some instances lots of consumer and family groups have as much direct access to members of the

legislature's as i would as a commissioner in virginia lots of them take advantage of the opportunity to influence of governors perspective and no health care on sunday afternoons in virginia i used to hear a lot of sams would call my office calling home make appointments to come by on a sunday afternoon to talk about what they thought needed to be occurring within the system relative to pass so it's a very different system and it was five years ten years twenty years ago when consumers in a family members and to many folk were long more passive who picks up the bill as well and health care in the united states is for the most part a state financed enterprise state governments provide the greatest majority of more funding and policy the federal government provides a sizable amount of money through medicaid for people who are on the ftc or elderly or physically mentally disabled the floor spar all this remains a state responsibility for government has not really had never really wanted a major handle animal health service delivery

are going back to them at fifty four the piers veto really wanna get involved in this business at all so it's really a state responsibility state texas has its responsibility state by state can we say that there's been a sufficient amount directed toward the situation money wise varies by state there is by decade there is by year some other states notably ohio put a tremendous amount of resources into their system for capita new programs new service delivery new directions and much of virginia's history course and i guess it's somewhat not correspondent to ohio with only one year the virginia got a major infusion of new dollars into it to houses now that may change this july but for the most part the states vary considerably in terms of the priorities given how you what causes the start to rise

a lot of the things you discover it if there's a new drug that's produced like laws are really state legislative bodies in response to marketing efforts by a pharmaceutical company may put more money into the tail scandals federal involvement federal lawsuits and many states when there's something tragic that happens in the whole system not only does the commission to fire but there is generally some new money that's put into a system to get some things changed in the eighties when the regulation was affected that field was their money saved at that time you probably turned in and the institutionalization yes well some people started out thinking that the institutions as she was going to save lots of money and in many respects they failed understand that it requires lots of money to keep a person housed fed medicated and healthy in a community and so i don't think we ever really truly got the level of projected savings that time many state governments thought that of

course that was a time when many people when they work de institutionalize work to scott cutlip said they really weren't part of the statistics anymore and a lot of people were problems the communities were not very well prepared to help sort through people and in the state hospital for twenty years thirty years forty years or so so a lot of people ended up homeless and a number of communities across the country but the cost for caring for those people wasn't necessarily any less of a community that was in state hospital not just that the cost is spread in some respects somewhat different cost there are some battles that the federal government has taken on that involve mental health to a degree yeah i would think that the war on drugs we would come under that is that a skirmish on i'm your friend sure a lot of the people who have traditional mental health problems also have proms of substance abuse call morbidity as we call the war on drugs is probably still somewhat obscure so

much or that we ever really made much of a dent you look around the country now in terms of the continued spread of cocaine use still a very significant progress in a lot of the people who had nonetheless also have coal current subsidies drugs alcohol use someone is the metaphor war insufficient or sufficient one drugs well just to to call it a war at all well i certainly news and four to refer to this population or to the problems i'd say it's an effort towards discovering we're no help freshman state government state governor's family members consumers are looking for ways to discover new ways and new methods of really preventing long in some respects intervene and hopefully at some point effectively treated uses words and we made a lot of progress in the last ten years or so a lot of progress are

there new disorders to come along and sing along and discovers there's something called age to mention that's probably one of the newest of all things but not much else that i would consider the news these disorders have been around a long time as far back as the egyptians of the human condition nature of the brain whereas i think the seat of almost all these disorders are brain chemistry now there's not much that's really definitive go back ages and ages ago and you find descriptions by physicians of the day of disorders that sound remarkably like what we're dealing with today either new drugs here is new in the sense that you have to google prozac that i'm sure everybody knows about but probably the most significant of the drugs today for me at least is a cynical claws are out a cause a penis some people talk about it as a drug that use with individuals who have not responded very well before to other drugs in the news for schizophrenia and it's a remarkable job and it has made a

major impact on about ten percent of the population or people with schizophrenia and i don't mean just a minor impact a major impact and i've seen remarkable changes in people's mood in the hold on reality on their physical abilities as well and many people that i know that are on the drugs are out of the hospital back in the community holding a job going to school in a very significant and probably again in my estimation the most remarkable of the new drugs have come on the market in a long long long time when state legislators deal with this issue and seek information from yourself from others for me in pharmaceutical lobbyists and from grassroots organizations does this mean that partisan politics an apartment cheer

parson politics are we're part of the decision to fund or not to fund the program whether to close out hospital beds and state hospital program in one community or another because of the impact on jobs which then impacts voters there are a lot of those issues that i would say sure get caught in partisan politics who proposes a bill if it comes from the republican side of the house on the democratic side because on the governor's office lots of those things can all know health issues are not magic in a sense and we're able to do away with partisan politics or partisan perspectives part of it has to do with how large people think government ought to be or how much involved in the lives of people legislators think the government of the summit that certainly keeps a cement around a partisan politics still there very much debate where do members of the public at large get their education when it comes to mental health issues do they have to

wait and to a relative or friend is affected before they learn what's going on there add two inches on one answer says that they get their their views and their perspectives from the worst of all the television shows and everything else that comes up where they get these distorted impressions about people with no sustained crazy and dangerous and to be avoided or that they're to be ridiculed in some way a lot of those there are movies with james there's even a place in my community that has crazy day sales that don't cause me lots of distress the other way though that people can get information off from a variety of community organizations no health associations in every community alliances for the mentally ill and every communities associations for retarded citizens substance abuse programs there are many sources and a number of very good programs on radio and television as well that talk about in very good layman's terms the nature of mental disorders and what

families in the vigils continue not only to recognize them but to seek some kind of support help treatment that kind of thing as well mental health slash mental retardation is usually a package label certainly in texas locally for some commissions and organizations our distinctly separate it depends on the country if you talk to some parents of persons with mental retardation very often they would like to keep her separate the problems of them to someone who might be mentally retarded still maybe i'm perfectly good model well it's possible in my estimation there's an overlap between a variety of these kinds of problems and very often people aren't unduly diagnosed with the problem of long summer tradition or problem of mental illness and substance abuse so the whole variety of these and

then it's possible to make some clear distinctions were you could say that a person has some problem of schizophrenia is not mentally retarded certain it's possible to do that and this done every day terms of the diagnosis and it's important to be able to make those distinctions as clearly as possible if you can fuse metal retardation with no votes than the wrong kinds of treatments can be implemented into a larger individual can make a person is retard and they're really mentally ill the wrong country to prevent computer in the earlier part of this country's history those distinctions weren't made it all so that a person within the repression but not anomalous could've been placed in an institution for the material or the reverse and since this is a person with a physical illness that resemble either mental retardation a mental illness was placed in an institution there for the rest of their lives in some instances because someone misdiagnosed their particular concept it's important to make that distinction when youngsters need a system for whatever

reasons what role do the schools play with here in public education are there forces at that level you can meet and diagnoses things fairly quickly again a lot depends upon where you are if you're in a reasonably wealthy community a school may have a school psychologist a school social worker school nurse sometimes a school physician and i personally be very instrumental in helping a teacher a counselor to recognize williams as having some kind of problem and make a referral or provide some kind of treatment for that individually if in a very poor area economically some of those supports may not be there or may not be there at the time that they're most needed for four young person almost all the referrals as i can recall for young people in school are also tend to come from teachers teachers referred to in a health agency teachers no problems because as we can spend a sometimes longer hours of the day so a lot of referrals come from teachers and school systems to mental health

agencies a lot of the health agencies have very good solid relationships with school systems and offer their services to school systems without regard to the income of the students who were there so it's a good source mean teachers are very adept very aware when her students are having a variety of issues and problems they noticed in as well in some instances no wonder major changes analyze a student center very good at providing some kind of intervention or unsure over the decades that the amount of help available in any school that almost certainly changed over the years as well as the amount of stress possibly the youngsters are going through as they pass through those formative years our parents as supportive of these professionals as they need to be hard to say hard to say

because again i think it is a reflection of communities and families i would think in some cases the parents might get a little defensive possible as well us appearance may not know a lot of that information for the question and your trees raised early to help people learn about how to get information about know most all the parents get the same faulty information from television shows or from whatever kinds of sources that they may have false misleading contradictory kind of information it doesn't help appeared to make a decision about what families are also in the time period they were living just to visit two parents working with that family that parent working on people going in lots of different directions and many parents simply may not have the time but take the time to devote to their youngsters and understanding some of the kinds of stresses and strains of the youngsters are ongoing and we said earlier that mean it is now on new under the sun

in some respects with mental health but surely the number it's exceedingly younger children that find themselves in the criminal justice system because of attacks that they commit a syndicate something's growing business early kids moves it may indicate something more about the nature of the values in our society and how people get here don't get hit or how people who in some respects don't get a hint of the frustration of not getting there may also be a reflection of the things that have been part of the united states is orientation for a long time about how to settle grievances we believed almost since they were probably since the origin of the country that it's okay to put a gun in someone's face and to get whatever it is that you think you want to tell the country in some respects was probably formed according to some say probably is not unusual for many of our youngsters in the time period which we are to think that they can settle arguments or find ways to is all part of their conflicts with other

people through violence that was established a self esteem even sure sure we are a lot of people in this country for their ability to force other people to do things a lot of our heroes now in the military but a lot of other places people who wielded the gun or deserted violence in authority and power over other people male female very often are so the youngsters is if anything probably reflect a lot of what they live and in our country we have lived violence for a long period time we've lived such an indiscriminate use of power in this country over the people for a longer time people were rewarded for that but i would say it was called the peacemakers if they don't get to support if they don't win medals then it seems like the prognosis was

poor who are the peacemakers well there's got to be somebody that keeps us from the edge of chaos british and whenever an they do exist in the communities and they are the people that nurture the next generation and bring people into safe adulthood that we don't honor them as to use your word the way we do other kinds of heroes the rays making video games that stranger if you follow that comment further you could say that we need to be developing or peacemakers and more methods for creating a piece within the community a lot of problems around the country are trying to teach youngsters how to resolve conflicts and non violent non aggressive kinds of ways and some of them have proven to be very successful we need to be able to model that a whole lot more so than youngsters recognize identify and put

value in finding these other kinds of peaceful ways of resolving problems and again i don't think we do probably nearly enough of honoring people and programs and approaches that that do that very well but that's part of the american character of the american characters such that we've probably put far too much stock in value an emphasis on the non peacemakers lifestyles that probably cause this country a lot of grief and a lot of cost it would change the paradigm well i wish i had the answer to that i'm not sure that there's anybody that has the answer but there are lots of approaches that people are using around the country to try to de escalate part of this kind of emphasis that i think we've had in the country for a long time part of that is is beginning to model different behaviors for kids how to resolve things as adults we need to be able to do that i would propose that we need to take a very careful look at the fourteen thousand five hundred deaths in which the

children in a country seen watch television until age eighty we model part of that behavior about solving conflict for films or movie programs at television lot of things like that through even the videogame so we exposed to lead and i think that raises a lot of issues about conscious or unconscious we are about the selling of violence in the united states part of for x ideas for me personally that i think we are is this really in and of value to them if we say to youngsters in this country that there are material things that one must have in order to have a positive sense a self esteem or to be accepted what have people think that you are someone of worth and the nose means to acquire those things are absent what is it to do with that frustration how they acquired the kinds of material things that they believe give them some sense of where i'd be established and set up a whole variety of very dilemmas for youngsters and dont provide much in the way of adequate <unk> to resolve those conflicts

and i think it puts the youngsters in very very very serious dilemmas and school systems in places with their with their peers because they never stop to feel foolish about wanting a pair of shoes that cost that much i don't think so it's part of our marketing we want youngsters to feel that we market our goods in our services and places for people don't necessarily have the money to acquire and will provide much in the way of the mechanism of the society for saint people you know have to have that or then you de escalate the desire in some ways of that person doesn't feel a degree of extreme frustration that many inches could feel that's not a good i'm not sure what their relatives are in terms of our society if you look internationally you don't find some of the same kinds of problems in some of the societies is we find in our country relative to the violence not everybody uses violence against texas was a study that was done some years ago where on american movies were introduced another country via television and i guess through videos

and youngsters had been measured in terms of the degree of aggressiveness before those movies were introduced and after year two years three years ever measured again and the level of aggressiveness and the answers and that's it had gone up in part depending upon the extent to which they were exposed to violent and violence laid move its center is a lot mr lang all their responsibility and films and it says a lot about the nature of the society and a lot of the leaders families school systems in the current models i think he displayed to children but the children learn inside of families that violence actually gets them something they want and really need to do they learned here what they learned at the hand of someone that close to age to eighteen months three years that you could settle a whole variety of things they believe were taught to regress of its tradition and its reinforced along the way do you

suggest that we should be rail that i think we did teach people how to raise children and raise the moon in a way that the kinds of things that we're seeing now are less likely to occur and i'm a father of three and i think that we can in fact teach children get what i think many in particular need to be more involved and how we teach our young males are you suggesting something in the curriculum sure i think that something and crick and the way that we teach teachers to teach children the way that wing structure our schools the size of her school's location for schools sure we can teach to lead not every child in america is violent so that there are a variety of things that i'm sure are occurring that would be of tremendous assistance to inches if we were to teach themselves and understand it a lot better or you had to get were concerned about so we start to search for some of those answers and business of

discovering what we do how do we do it what kind of society do we want to have where youngsters do we want egyptians used to pass what they call the questions of all questions why life or death and we need to be asking similar consequences in this country not philosophical in that room but what kind of society do we want what kind of demeanor do we want from youngsters what kind of adults do we wish to have for the future and once identify more clearly what is it we want the vision was some other ways of getting there began to make more sense if we say we want a society in which youngsters when our youngsters are treating each other in different kinds of ways how do we get there we can get there without asking a question it can get there without basically identifying to some extent what can a society we want to ask the hard questions and then start to plant as much as we can't how do we do that and it says a lot about who teaches children which each children are taught how teachers are taught the way that families are talked to rear their

children or kind of assistance there is for those individuals is a lot but i think that we as a society our guest a former standup routine e davis after davis' a professor of social policy at the school of social work at virginia commonwealth university he was the robert sutherland visiting scholar at the school of social work at the university of texas at austin the views expressed on this program do not necessarily reflect the views of the university of texas at austin or the station technical producer for foreign david alvarez i'm a producer and host olive green is available and navy purchased by writing for and

cassettes communication giving the ut austin austin texas seventy seventy one to that's for a cassettes communication at ut austin austin texas seventy seven went to the university of texas at austin this is the la morning radio network this week on for heaney davis there are probably no more greater degrees of comfort with the diagnosis of the loans and if you go back five years ten years fifteen twenty years or so it was much more sensitive to a mental health report this week