The Way I See It: When Mental Illness Strikes

  Nearly 40 years of experience in news reporting on government as well as counseling in two state programs never prepared me for dealing with the pervasive problems when a family member suffered mental illness.

  Teenagers are a challenge for any parent, particularly looking forward to seeing a young person cross the bridge to become an adult.  Even more heartbreaking is watching a happy, intelligent, outgoing young person turn into a withdrawn, troubled, sometimes violent person with no interest in school or little else. Then doctors reported a diagnosis of schizophrenia and bipolar, a combination that is difficult to treat.

  However, they also tell patients and their families that the right medicines and staying on them can lead to a "normal life." That often is much more difficult than it appears.

  It is terrifying seeing the changes that comes over someone you care about when they are consumed with symptoms of mental illness.  Mood swings, hallucinations, delusions are among the symptoms that caused such drastic changes.  The lack of comprehensive help from doctors, hospitals, insurance officials, even support groups left more roadblocks than solutions.

  The basic problem centers around insurance companies holding down their costs and doctors basically leaning to help insurance companies rather than  patients. Treatment available was hospitalization or outpatient programs.   Outpatient programs are designed for patients who are stable on medicine and need education more than medical treatment.  That is no place for a patient whose symptoms are not being controlled by the medicine, isn't taking enough medicine or does not yet have enough in his system.

  The major problem was finding long-term treatment, specifically mental health treatment providing enough time for the patient to become stable on medicine before being released.  In this case, there were five hospitalizations in barely over two months, all less than two weeks long  Most medical personnel say it takes at least a month for enough medicine to get in anyone's system to show results.  Specifically finding a long term affordable program was the problem. 

  Hospital treatment for mental health was getting a patient out of a crisis, such as a suicide attempt or hallucinations, but getting past the crisis does not mean a patient is stable.  It just sets up conditions for another crisis.  Having a patient in treatment for four to six weeks would be less costly and more helpful for the patient than eight or ten weeks spread out, but that makes too much sense and was ignored by doctors and insurance companies.

  In the beginning, it appeared that family and medical or related issues were all that was involved, but with time it spread farther than anyone anticipated.  Early in the search for appropriate treatment, it became obvious to seek Medicaid which would cover long term treatment.  The process involved a lot of red tape, finding and keeping records, updating the application with every event and hospitalization. That took hours, days and months as well as a lot of waiting.

  With Cobb County or state mental health programs, the patient didn't qualify for services because, they said,  he was covered with insurance even though the insurance did not cover long term treatment needed with the severe symptoms.  The inability to find necessary mental health services became an unbelievable disaster, but that was just the beginning and much worse trouble was ahead.