The journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law
-
J. Am. Acad. Psychiatry Law · Jan 2013
ReviewChallenges for Canada in meeting the needs of persons with serious mental illness in prison.
The number of prison inmates is predicted to rise in Canada, as is concern about those among them with mental illness. This article is a selective literature review of the epidemiology of serious mental illness (SMI) in prisons and how people with SMI respond to imprisonment. We review the required service components with a particular focus on care models for people with SMI in the Canadian correctional system. ⋯ Many of those with SMI are lost to follow-up within months of re-entering the community. There is much policy and service development aimed at improving services in Canada. However, the multijurisdictional organization of health care and the heterogeneity of the SMI population complicate these developments.
-
In summary, to characterize addiction as a disease is not necessarily morally incompatible with saying that addicts are responsible for yielding to it. This is admittedly a demanding approach to responsibility, but our criminal law has always set the bar pretty high. Holding addicts responsible is also strongly supported on utilitarian grounds because the threat of sanctions provides leverage to press them into treatment and to keep them engaged while therapeutic efforts are undertaken. ⋯ In this connection, the similarity between addiction and other chronic diseases, which lies at the heart of the brain disease claim, becomes particularly pertinent. Yes, addiction is best understood as a chronic relapsing disorder. This helps to establish realistic expectations for the benefits of treatment, but it also emphasizes the important role of behavior in disease management and points in the direction of a theory of responsibility for managing one's own illness.
-
J. Am. Acad. Psychiatry Law · Jan 2004
Comparative StudyPatterns of spouse and child maltreatment by discharged U.S. Army soldiers.
The transitional compensation (TC) program of the U. S. Army provides financial and other benefits to the families of service members discharged for child or spouse maltreatment. ⋯ The severity of maltreatment in the ACR of TC child and spouse victims was greater than the overall severity of maltreatment for those in the ACR database who were not in the TC database. Other children in the family who had not been identified as TC victims also had an ACR history that was more severe. Health and social service agencies should be aware of the TC program and be knowledgeable about its benefits for family members of soldiers discharged for abuse-related offenses.
-
J. Am. Acad. Psychiatry Law · Jan 2007
CommentCommentary: delving further into liability for psychotherapy supervision.
In their article, "Liability and Risk Management in Outpatient Psychotherapy Supervision," Recupero and Rainey discuss some of the difficult matters related to outpatient psychotherapy supervision. We offer this commentary to make observations about their article and to further the discussion of liability and risk management. We believe there is a need to include this type of information in the orientation of supervisors and supervises and to make discussions of liability and risk management a part of outpatient psychotherapy supervision.