In light of what is happening at the Ma'ale HaCarmel Psychiatric Hospital - the shocking murder of Little Yael Melnik, and the subsequent suicide of a girl from the same institution - a demand was made to close the ward.
Indeed, urgent intervention is needed in the state of the mental health system in general, and in "Ma'ale HaCarmel" in particular, but the demand to close is not in the right direction.
Psychiatric hospitalization comes as a last resort, from lack of choice.
Those who do not distinguish between good and evil come to the wards.
Those who need to be kept from harming themselves, those who have nowhere else in the world to lay their wounded souls.
The conditions in the psychiatric hospital are not good enough.
point.
But in the face of the flood of hospitalizations, there is no other option.
Closing a psychiatric ward will not solve the problem.
In parallel - when there are too many patients in need of respiration, and patients collapse and die because there are not enough respirators - the solution is not to close the intensive care unit.
We have seen this in the Corona crisis - the right solution is additional budgets, and the mobilization of elite forces.
The possibility of providing public mental health care is being erased.
Mental health care is not just about medication.
Psychological treatment empowers the mind.
He needs long-term training, empathy, in-depth understanding and sufficient space for work.
It wasn’t just solved with balls and a ten-minute meeting once a quarter.
The possibility of receiving beneficial, long-term and supportive public mental health care is almost non-existent at the moment.
It is easier to get medication.
But drugs (effective, whose dignity is in place) do not change things fundamentally.
They do not process trauma, do not change behavior patterns or build a safe environment.
Psychosocial intervention is needed here.
Those who can afford it - turn to private treatment.
And those who do not - as in any neglected chronic illness - are deteriorating.
Imagine medical departments coming to you and no staff.
There is no one to dissect, to give birth, to have women.
This is the situation in psychiatric hospitals today.
The gap between the working conditions and the remuneration they receive is unbearable.
And who is promiscuous?
The patients.
Therefore, the urgent call should sound like this - do not stop the center's activities and send patients to the street, but raise funds urgently.
Place more mental "soul machines".
Build long-term hospitalizations that will prevent a “revolving door,” where patients are released quickly and they return sicker.
Allow patients time to connect, time for a sufficiently long and safe treatment process.
Make sure that the standards of psychology are met, by paying them fairly.
Bring in an elite nursing staff.
Choose empathic physicians who will work while understanding the patient's personality, beyond prescribing medications.
Provide professional guidance, and a safe environment in which staff members are also given a space for thinking that allows.
This is the urgent call that needs to come out - set up an elite patrol of therapists in this department, who will promote and improve the place beyond recognition (yes, even if you have to pay them enough to return to work from the private market).
It will be a change with a vision, which will save the lives of those staying in the ward, now and in the future.
Were we wrong?
Fixed!
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