It is estimated that around 170,000 people each year deliberately harm themselves. Of these, around 80,000 of those who attend the casualty department never receive a phychological assessment or follow-up. This is despite the fact that the risk of committing suicide after self-harming is 100 times greater than the average risk in the rest of the population.You'd think that self harmers would be 'in safe hands' at hostpial, but there is growing concern and evidence (and I can back this up with personal experience) that self harmers sometimes receive a poorer standard of NHS care than other patients that were deemed to have sustained their injuries by accident. Self harmers are classified with drug addicts, drunks, glue sniffers and other groups who are in the same vicious cycle of tranquilizing their anxiety by inflicting harm and pain to themselves.
There is a deep seated feeling among some health care staff that self harmers of all kinds, clog the system, and consume resources that should be allocated to the 'deserving'. Charactistically, this goes with a general lack of patience when dealing with self harmers, right alongside the sarcastic or cutting remarks, that demean the self harmer, and sap their already low self esteem. Indeed, Professor Paul Lelliott, the director of the Royal College of Psychiatrists Research Unit, is reported as saying; "There are still examples of people having wounds stitched without anaesthetic, the idea being 'well you cut yourself without anaesthetic, so why should we use it?'"How barbaric is that??
This is not to say this sort of thing happens in all hospitals, and is not representative of the feelings of all staff. Many casualty staff are highly sympathetic and understand there is an underlying cause to the actions of a self harmer, which may require the efforts of other fields of medicine to resolve.
This is not to say this sort of thing happens in all hospitals, and is not representative of the feelings of all staff. Many casualty staff are highly sympathetic and understand there is an underlying cause to the actions of a self harmer, which may require the efforts of other fields of medicine to resolve.
[taken from: Distant Healer.Co.UK]
2 comments:
I was never treated for SH injuries in hospital, so I'm not speaking from direct experience.
I imagine though, that a lot of bad behaviour and negative attitudes from health "professionals" come from fear. Most of the time, and kind of difference is feared, and when people react from a place of fear they don't often make good choices.
Maybe for some doctors, the thought of someone harming themselves is that frightening and is such a contradiction to everything they believe in, that they are unable to see past the action to the person.
This doesn't excuse their attitudes, personally I think they should get over themselves and get a clue, but it helps me to acknowledge that it is their issue, not mine.
You could have a point there Alison, fear of what we dont understand can cloud professionalism..
I also think a large part is the moral judgements health professionals make. As the article suggests, people with SH, addiction issues etc are seen as less deserving as they have inflicted the harm as opposed to an accident. There is also bias and lack of understanding towards mental health issues in general...
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