Mental Health of The Lower Class

Psychiatric patients sees their therapists a month is significantly different between classes (Am J Public Health). “The higher classes receive more frequent and longer treatments than that of the lower classes. ” While higher classes are treated with seeing private practitioners, the lower classes are mainly treated with less therapy time, and techniques such as “organic therapy and medication. ” This isn’t the first instance in history where the lower classes are left behind to struggle. Take into consideration a comparison to social class superiority on the Titanic (unsinkable ship in 1912).

Disparities in Mental Health Treatment

The crew used their passengers’ class status to determine who lived and who drowned. (Am J Public Health). This is the case with today’s mental health treatments as well. The higher classes receive more effective treatment, while the lower classes are left to “drown” with timeless recommendations of medication (Am J Public Health). It has also been found that children who grow up dealing with “toxic stress (neglect, abuse, seeing violence in the home)” are more likely to develop a mental illness in adulthood. Although there are concerns while they are still children, being that one-third of all students with mental health conditions dropout of school. This result in possible troubles finding a jobs, getting insurance, or treating their ongoing mental illnesses (US Department of Education). As you can see mental illness results in an endless cycle because most lower class citizens do not get the chance to fix their illnesses, just prolong them. Through regulations, protections, research, and funding, the federal government is working toward improving our nation's mental health care systems. By making regulations, the government allows United States citizens to be able to interact with legislators and come up with ideas to fix our countries mental health crisis.

Government Initiatives for Mental Health Care

The federal government have begun coming up with protections for the mentally ill in order for them to keep their jobs while they seek treatment rather than just being unemployed and suffering more. Programs such as Medicaid or Medicare and the VA (Department of Veterans Affairs) are being funded by the federal government as well in order to insure mental health care is accessible to everyone, including even those of the lowest social classes. Along with funding such programs, the government funds research on mental illnesses. This helps give our country's mental health care system a better understanding of the causes for such illnesses or to study how new treatments will affect the mentally ill. Through these four methods, the federal government will continue to work toward improving this country’s mental health care systems, even for the lowest classes. (“The Federal and State Role in Mental Health”)

Challenges Faced by Lower Class Individuals

All findings have shown that the lower classes have harder times treating and handling their mental illnesses, due to class superiority or lack of insurance and simple medical support. However, our government is working to put an end to the evident divide between lower and higher class treatment methods, as well as support systems. Until a solution is found, mental illness will continue to be a concern in the United States, especially with statistics proving mental health issues is most abundant in the lower classes.