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I need help writing a report that provides a justification for the…

I need help writing a report that provides a justification for the mental health interventions to be delivered by an organisation that seeks to improve the levels of mental health within a community (as described in the hypothetical scenario below in italics). Your report should be written in language suitable for an audience that is used to understanding evidence but does not necessarily have expertise in this field. The report should refer to evidence and theory to support the case being made.

 

 

This exercise requires that you put yourself in the position of someone who works for an organisation (a charity) that has experience of providing a range of services aimed at serving the mental health needs of the town of ‘Darborough’.

As part of a national policy initiative, your charity has been asked to draw up plans for services to be provided in the event of local people experiencing trauma following a particular crisis or disaster.

You are asked to provide a justification for receiving funding for the services that you would like to provide. Your organisation takes a service user-led, collaborative approach, meaning that all services are co-produced by people who have experience of using mental health services and professionals. Both professionals and service users are represented in the leadership of the organisation.

Your organisation seeks funding to provide interventions at two levels:

Individual psychotherapy, where clients can self-refer or they might be referred by another agency.
Activism and campaigning within the community. This might involve initiatives and campaigns within the local community on issues that have been identified as relevant to mental health problems that might occur due to, or be exacerbated by, a particular crisis or disaster. Issues to consider might be, for example: those concerning the capacity of the community to respond, or the inequality of impacts that might be associated with poverty and social exclusion.

You are required to deliver a report that presents an outline of the interventions that you would like to provide and a justification for their provision.

You have been informed that the people reading and assessing the report want to understand the reasons behind each of these interventions, and the evidence that exists to support the approach.

 

GUIDANCE ON HOW TO WRITE THE REPORT: 

The report should have the following structure (the word lengths should be used as a guide):

Introduction:

This should briefly explain the background to the report, and summarise its important points, including a brief rationale and purpose of the interventions that would be provided.

A service user-led approach:

This section should provide a justification for why your organisation seeks to take a service user-led approach and what can be gained from this way of working. A good answer will show critical awareness of the significance of the service-user movement and some of the key criticisms that have been made of mental health service delivery. It will include awareness of the ethical and practical advantages of service-user involvement alongside some of the potential obstacles and difficulties that can be encountered.

Individual therapy: justifying using the individual modality.

Here you need to briefly describe the nature of the first intervention which is a form of individual psychotherapy. You should choose one of the treatment modalities that you have focused on in the module. You should select either a CBT, OR a psychodynamic, OR a person-centred/humanistic approach.

You should justify the use of the approach by referring to relevant literature. You will need to demonstrate critical engagement with relevant theory and research evidence to back up the claims that you are making. You should avoid spending too much time describing the intervention, as higher marks will be awarded for explaining concepts and using research evidence to back up your claims.

Community activism/campaigning: those responsible for funding are particularly interested in your organisation’s support for approaches that do not solely rely on professional mental health interventions, but instead seek to strengthen the capacity of communities to cope with crises and support individuals who are impacted. They have asked you to:

explain this community-orientated approach, using theory and evidence to explain why this is preferable to relying solely on individual therapeutic interventions
give some examples of work in this area.
Conclusion (150 words): summarise the main arguments for the approaches that you have adopted.