Tag: World Federation for Mental Health

What is the World Federation for Mental Health?

Published on by Andrew Marshall1 Comment

Introduction

The World Federation for Mental Health (WFMH) is an international, multi-professional non-governmental organisation (NGO), including citizen volunteers and former patients. It was founded in 1948 in the same era as the United Nations (UN) and the World Health Organisation (WHO).

Outline

The goal of this international organisation includes;

  • The prevention of mental and emotional disorders;
  • The proper treatment and care of those with such disorders; and
  • And the promotion of mental health.

The Federation, through its members and contacts in more than 94 countries on six continents, has responded to international mental health crises through its role as the only worldwide grassroots advocacy and public education organisation in the mental health field. Its organisational and individual membership includes mental health workers of all disciplines, consumers of mental health services, family members, and concerned citizens. At its very outset the WFMH was concerned with educating both the public and influential professionals, and with human relations, with a view both to the health of individuals and that of groups and nations. The WFMH founding document, “Mental Health and World Citizenship”, understood “world citizenship” in terms of a “common humanity” respecting individual and cultural differences, and declared that “the ultimate goal of mental health is to help [people] live with their fellows in one world.

Members include mental health service providers and service users. In 2009, the World Fellowship for Schizophrenia and Allied Disorders, an international network of families of people with serious mental illness, merged with the World Federation. The World Federation has close ties with the World Health Organization. For many years after its founding, the WFMH was the only NGO of its kind with a close working relationship with UN agencies, particularly the WHO. In recent decades, though, a number of international mental health organisations, often limited to members of particular professions, have developed. In varying degree they have filled needs formerly addressed mainly by WFMH. The WFMH envisions a world in which mental health is a priority for all people. Public policies and programs reflect the crucial importance of mental health in the lives of individuals. The first Director General of the WHO, G. Brock Chisholm, who was a psychiatrist, was one of the leaders in forming the federation with the goal of creating a representative organisation that could consult with the UN on mental health issues.

The mission of the World Federation for Mental Health is to promote the advancement of mental health awareness, prevention of mental disorders, advocacy, and best practice recovery focused interventions worldwide. Mental health day is celebrated at the initiative of the World Federation of Mental Health and WHO supports this initiative through raising awareness on mental health issues using its strong relationships with the Ministries of health and civil society organisations across the globe. Mental Illness Awareness Week (MIAW) is an annual national public education campaign designed to help open the eyes of Canadians to the reality of mental illness. The week was established in 1992 by the Canadian Psychiatric Association, and is now coordinated by the Canadian Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health (CAMIMH) in cooperation with all its member organisations and many other supporters across Canada.

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article < https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Federation_for_Mental_Health >; it is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA). You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the CC-BY-SA.

Who was Clifford Whittingham Beers (1876-1943)?

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Introduction

Clifford Whittingham Beers (30 March 1876 to 09 July 1943) was the founder of the American mental hygiene movement.

Biography

Beers in 1908, from the frontispiece of his book.

Beers was born in New Haven, Connecticut, to Ida and Robert Beers on 30 March 1876. He was one of five children, all of whom would suffer from psychological distress and would spend time in mental institutions, including Beers himself (see “Clifford W. Beers, Advocate for the Insane”). He graduated from the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale in 1897, where he was business manager of The Yale Record and a member of Berzelius.

In 1900 he was first confined to a private mental institution for depression and paranoia. He would later be confined to another private hospital as well as a state institution. During these periods he experienced and witnessed serious maltreatment at the hands of the staff. His book A Mind That Found Itself (1908), an autobiographical account of his hospitalisation and the abuses he suffered, was widely and favourably reviewed, became a bestseller, and is still in print.

Beers gained the support of the medical profession and others in the work to reform the treatment of the mentally ill. In 1908 Beers founded the “Connecticut Society for Mental Hygiene”, now named Mental Health Connecticut. In 1909 Beers founded the “National Committee for Mental Hygiene”, renamed “National Mental Health Association”, now named “Mental Health America”, in order to continue the reform for the treatment of the mentally ill.

He also started the Clifford Beers Clinic in New Haven in 1913, the first outpatient mental health clinic in the United States.

Beers became Honorary President of the World Federation for Mental Health.

Beers was a leader in the field until his retirement in 1939. He died in Providence, Rhode Island, on 09 July 1943.

The Extra Mile in Washington, D.C., selected Beers as one of its 37 honourees. The Extra Mile pays homage to Americans like Beers who set their own self-interest aside to help others and successfully brought positive social change to the United States.

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article < https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clifford_Whittingham_Beers >; it is used under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (CC-BY-SA). You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the CC-BY-SA.