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Mental health and the patient, family and care provider While ‘mental health’ is now a phrase used regularly and widely in society, how many of us prioritise it for ourselves? But, as Breakthrough Case Management discuss here, the need to consider mental health is absolutely vital in rehabilitation for both the injured person and their family - as well as for those tasked with delivering the life-changing care Now, more than ever before, the focus is firmly on mental health. As something that impacts everyone in society, and the struggle with isolation and lockdowns leaving few of us untouched over the past two years, mental health is something that is rightly now in wide discussion. But, in reality, how many people are actually looking after their mental health? Is the awareness translating into action and support? Certainly, in rehabilitation, the need to consider the mental health of someone living with lifechanging injury is paramount. Research clearly links the failure to do so with a limit on the progress they make in their physical recovery. For their family and loved ones too, the impact on their mental health of their lives being changed beyond recognition is vast. But for those case managers, clinicians and care workers whose role it is to support these people, to maximise the recovery potential of their loved one, their mental health is seriously under pressure too. With an ongoing recruitment crisis into social care and burnout and people leaving the profession being at an all-time high, are they considering themselves at any point? “Mental health affects absolutely every one of
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us,” says Kate Golding, a leading figure in infant, child, adolescent and adult mental health nationally, who recently joined fastgrowing Breakthrough Case Management. “We all need to take some responsibility for it. We've got to be personally accountable and do as much as we can to stay well ourselves - but amidst life in general, sometimes the mental health needs we all have can be overlooked.” “After life-changing injury, the lives of people and their families will never be the same, their children’s lives are turned upside down overnight, and the injured person’s life as they knew it has changed beyond recognition,” continues Annabelle Lofthouse, co-founder and director of Breakthrough, which was recently rated Outstanding at its first CQC inspection. “And for those working in healthcare, whose job it is to support them, their mental health needs attention too. While they will always look at things from a client perspective, they need to think of themselves too.” Here, Kate and Annabelle discuss the vital role of good mental health in the patient, their family and the care professional, and the steps that can be taken to maximise our emotional wellbeing.
Patient Following a traumatic brain injury, given the challenging circumstances in which most people find themselves and the rehabilitation journey they often need to embark on, it is understandable that a significant proportion of survivors will experience a decline in mental health. “But this is against a backdrop of one in four people being diagnosed with a mental health issue at any time, even without brain injury,” says Kate, who is a national trainer for Mental Health First Aid England. “A traumatic brain injury is going to dramatically increase your likelihood of mental illness, and that is including things like mild head injuries or concussion too, which affect one in three of us at some point in our lives.” But while it is so commonplace, why is mental health not always given the same prominence as physical recovery, particularly in lifechanging injury? “You can't measure mental health in the same way as you can a broken bone, but we're finding more and more that there are links between the body and the mind,” continues Kate.
