Fragmented services, unmet needs: Building collaboration between the mental health and domestic violence communities

Health Affairs

Volumn 22, Issue 5, 2003, Pages 230-234

  Warshaw, Carole ^a   Gugenheim, Ada Mary ^b   Moroney, Gabriela ^c   Barnes, Holly ^c  

^a Jr Hospital of Cook County   (United States)

^b Chicago Community Trust   (United States)

^c DVMHPI ^*

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; BATTERED WOMAN; COMMUNITY CARE; COOPERATION; FEMALE; HEALTH SERVICE; HUMAN; MENTAL HEALTH SERVICE; ORGANIZATION; ORGANIZATION AND MANAGEMENT; PARTNER VIOLENCE; PATIENT ADVOCACY; PILOT STUDY; PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT; PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECT; PUBLIC RELATIONS; SAFETY; SOCIAL WORK; UNITED STATES;

BATTERED WOMEN; CHICAGO; COMMUNITY MENTAL HEALTH SERVICES; COMMUNITY NETWORKS; COOPERATIVE BEHAVIOR; FEMALE; HEALTH SERVICES NEEDS AND DEMAND; HUMANS; INTERINSTITUTIONAL RELATIONS; ORGANIZATIONAL INNOVATION; PATIENT ADVOCACY; PILOT PROJECTS; PROGRAM DEVELOPMENT; SAFETY; SOCIAL WORK; SPOUSE ABUSE;

EID: 1542575669     PISSN: 02782715     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1377/hlthaff.22.5.230     Document Type: Article

References (13)

1. For mental health clinicians, advocacy concerns include attention to safety, confidentiality, accountability of perpetrators, documentation, and information about community resources. For domestic violence advocates, trauma perspectives are beneficial in understanding the psychological impact of trauma, destigmatizing responses to mental health issues, and working more effectively with those domestic violence survivors who also have mental health needs. In this report "advocacy" refers to domestic violence advocacy.
2. See J. Golding, "Intimate Partner Violence as a Risk Factor for Mental Disorders: A Meta-Analysis," Journal of Family Violence 14, no. 2 (1999):99-132;
3. J.D. Osofsky, "The Impact of Violence on Children," Future of Children (Winter 1999): 33-49;
4. and L.A. Goodman et al., "Physical and Sexual Assault History in Women with Serious Mental Illness: Prevalence, Correlates, Treatment, and Future Research Directions," Schizophrenia Bulletin 23, no. 4 (1997): 685-696.
5. Domestic violence is also a serious problem for the lesbian, gay, and transgendered communities, but mental health data on it are still limited.
6. Examples include conducting couples therapy while violence is ongoing, using an abusive partner as a source of collateral information, failing to document a woman's efforts to protect and care for her children, or assigning diagnoses without appropriately linking symptoms to abuse.
7. C. Warshaw, G. Moroney, and H. Barnes, Report on Mental Health Issues and Service Needs in Chicago Area Domestic Violence Advocacy Programs, January 2003, www.dvmhpi.org/Publications.htm (7 July 2003).
8. C. Warshaw and G. Moroney, "Mental Health and Domestic Violence: Collaborative Initiatives, Service Models, and Curricula," Working Paper, September 2002, www.dvmhpi.org/Publications. htm (7 July 2003).
9. "Trauma" refers to both individual trauma and the social trauma of poverty and discrimination.
10. Curricula for treating child trauma generally address the impact of recent abuse on parenting but do not focus on parents' own childhood abuse, which could affect their ability to respond to children's trauma-related needs. Adult mental health models rarely focus on parenting.
11. In the past, domestic violence agencies typically tried to screen out women who gave any indication of having a psychiatric diagnosis; now, programs are better able to work with women whom they would have turned away in the past.
12. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Mental Health: A Report of the Surgeon General (Rockville, Md.: DHHS, 1999);
13. and President's New Freedom Commission on Mental Health, Achieving the Promise: Transforming Mental Health Care in America, Final Report to the President, July 2003, www.mentalhealthcommission.gov/ reports/reports.htm (23 July 2003).