A four-tiered approach to professional development in the area of parental mental illness.
The basis of professional learning in this area (the first tier in Figure 27.1) is to combat stigmatizing beliefs that many professionals and members of the public have toward those with a mental illness. While this is explored further in Chapter 6, it is important to note here that the myths and shame associated with mental illness can impede the seeking of help (Reupert and Maybery, 2010). As seen in Chapter 6, many members of the mental health workforce hold stigmatizing views of those with a mental illness. One antistigma strategy directed at professionals may be for them to hear the stories of consumers in relation to their parenting role (Reupert and Maybery, 2008); to this end, several resources provide video links to families describing what it is like to live with parental mental illness (e.g., “Let’s Talk About Children”).
The second tier in the hierarchy is raising professionals’ awareness about the needs of parents and children in families where a parent has a mental illness. This might be directed to a broad audience of professionals, including those who do not necessarily work in mental health (e.g., teachers) but who nonetheless need to be able to support children. The “Keeping Families and Children in Mind” and “Parental Mental Health and Families” resources are examples of general awareness-raising approaches that might be employed at this level.
The third tier recognizes that different discipline groups (e.g., psychiatric nurses, social workers) have different professional development needs due to prior experience, training, or treatment paradigms (see Maybery et al., 2014). This tier also acknowledges that professionals from different agencies (e.g., child versus adult) as well as those working in different roles (manager versus clinician) have different learning needs. For example, adult mental health clinicians might need to learn how to incorporate clients’ parenting role into their treatment plan, while those working in children’s services may need to acquire skills in raising the potentially sensitive issue of mental health issues with a parent. Infusing family-sensitive practice around everyday work with such families is the key to this level.
The final tier in this hierarchy involves specific training for mental health professionals who work therapeutically with a family member or with the family as a whole. Here the focus is on addressing the impact of the parent’s mental illness on children and involves targeted, refined skill training for delivering a specific intervention. Available resources include “Let’s Talk About Children” for working with the parent, or “Family Focus,” which promotes skills for working with parents and children.
Conclusion
It is commonly accepted that lifelong learning is an accepted part of working life. As professional development is a core implementation component (Fixen et al., 2005), it is essential that effective and accessible resources be made available for different members of the mental health workforce, along with follow-up support and consultation. Different professionals will have different training needs depending on their role and responsibilities within an organization. We also believe that it is critical to actively involve family members and professionals in the development, implementation, and evaluation of resources, to ensure that programs are relevant and effective. Refined learning pathways need to be developed that demonstrate professionals’ level of readiness to practice following completion of e-learning training in conjunction with effective implementation strategies for professionals to apply learned skills in practice settings.
References
Related posts:
Thinking about children of parents with mental illnesses as a form of intergenerational dialog and practice
Mothers with eating disorders and their children
Helping children understand their parent’s mental illness
A personal recovery model for parents with mental health problems
Preventing unnecessary loss of child custody
Parental psychiatric disorder: translating The Family Model into practice change
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