Use Of Community Treatment Research Articles

Compulsory community treatment and ethnicity: Findings from a culturally and linguistically diverse area of Queensland

ObjectiveTo compare the use of community treatment orders (CTOs) and forensic orders (FOs) in a culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) population to that in a non-CALD population. MethodsWe analysed the relationship between coming from a CALD background and the use of CTOs and FOs on discharge from hospital using merged data from the Metro South Addiction and Mental Health Service's Transitions of Care (ToC) and Consumer Integrated Mental Health Application (CIMHA) databases. ResultsNine hundred and seventy-six individual records were included in the data set, of whom eighty-six were from a CALD background (8.8%). Three hundred and eleven patients were on compulsory community treatment. Use of compulsory community treatment (CTOs and FOs) was similar for those born in Australasia, British Isles, North America and Europe but significantly higher for those born elsewhere even after adjusting for socio-demographic and clinical variables (Adj OR 2.19, 95% CI 1.36–3.52). The use of an interpreter significantly increased the likelihood of compulsory community treatment (Adj OR 2.76, 95% CI 1.20–6.35). Restricting the analyses to CTOs only did not alter these results. ConclusionsMetro South residents from a CALD background outside of Europe were over-represented on compulsory community treatment orders. This could reflect the difficulties in accessing voluntary services, communication barriers, stigma associated with mental illness, discrimination, or issues related to accurately diagnosing mental illness cross-culturally. Clinicians need to be aware of the complexity of working with people from diverse cultures and apply these orders judiciously.

Factors in the Selection of Patients for Conditional Release From Their First Psychiatric Hospitalization

Factors in the Selection of Patients for Conditional Release From Their First Psychiatric Hospitalization

A quantitative framework for evaluating the effect of community treatment on the morbidity due to ascariasis

There is growing emphasis on the use of community treatment to reduce the level of morbidity caused by helminth infection. The design of chemotherapy programmes, in terms of frequency of treatment and proportion of the community treated, would be assisted by a quantitative framework which enabled the morbidity reduction achieved by different approaches to be compared. The present study describes a model developed for this purpose which embodies two innovative features. First, a quantitative score of morbidity (the proportion of individuals harbouring an intense infection) is used to rate the success of a programme and, second, the distribution of helminths in the host population is generated by a mechanism that allows the distribution to change dynamically as a function of both treatment and reinfection. The model behaviour, using values typical of Ascaris lumbricoides, indicates that the benefit derived from community chemotherapy increases non-linearly with the coverage and efficacy of treatment.

Community-Based Correctional Treatment: Rationale and Problems

A major theme in the recommendations of the President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administra tion of Justice (hereinafter referred to as the National Crime Commission) was that the nation's correctional services should place a much greater emphasis upon community-based treatment of offenders. It was asserted that the line between institutional and community treatment should be blurred by releasing offenders on work furloughs and educational levels and by developing halfway facilities designed to allow for resumption of community responsibilities in a gradual and closely supervised fashion. Probation and parole should be greatly increased and strengthened, according to the Commis sion. The findings upon which these recommendations were based concerned both the gross inadequacy of the present cor rectional system and the promising results of recent experi ments in expanded and intensified community treatment. In moving toward the increased use of community treatment, many problems must be overcome, including a lack of research information on the effectiveness of particular techniques; re sistance to needed changes on the part of traditionalist staff and organizational systems; the difficulty of creating new and noncriminal identities for ex-offenders; and the problem of drawing community institutions into the task. The national attention which has been focused upon the needs of the cor rectional field has created an unprecedented opportunity to bring new resources and methods to the solution of these problems.