Mental Health 30 Years On

national | health / disability issues | news report Thursday October 10, 2019 15:42 by Sean Crudden - impero

Festina Lente

Dear Friends

A general meeting of IMPERO will take place on Saturday 12 October 2019 at 14:00. Fr. Stephen Duffy PP, Lordship and Ravensdale, has kindly given permission to use the meeting room in our Lady of The Wayside Church, Jenkinstown, Co. Louth, for our meeting. We will meet there.

Agenda

1. Read minutes of the previous meeting
2. Confirm officer board for 2019/2020
3. Sean Crudden will read his thread on the UNDP (United Nations' Development Program) Global Development Hub. The recent on-line consultation was around the question of digitalisation and the sustainable development goals of the UN
4. Equality
5. Finances
6. Fix dates and venues for meetings for the next year
7. Strategy

Due to unavoidable circumstances the meeting scheduled for mid-June was let slide but, hopefully, this will not happen again. The meeting on the 12th is important for IMPERO. It is also taking place at a time of universal change. Is there any way technology can be turned to the advantage of the mental patient?

The meeting is open to everyone. But, if you are coming to the meeting, let us know beforehand so that we can make proper provision for all those attending.

Yours faithfully

Seán Crudden
Secretary
IMPERO

Lower Jenkinstown
Dundalk
A91 A092

0858636391

IMPERO celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. It was founded formally on 1 April 1989 at a public meeting in Ballymascanlon Hotel. Of course it existed for a number of years before that in an informal way.

We have never really been involved in advocacy on an individual level for any patient. We tried it once and the result was hopeless. So we learned a lesson and kept away from that entirely ever afterwards.

We presume there is good will between doctor and patient and we are confident of the good will of nurses and carers. We are not in a position to tell anyone how to do their job. Of course we wish that patients on an individual level are listened to. But it is impossible to escape the suspicion that many of the fundamentals of the mental health system are not thought out or thought through fully. And we long for a better way.

There have been changes in the past 30 years. A change of attitude rather than a change of methodology. But there is still a lot of unnecessary suffering and a lot of casualties.

IMPERO has kept in touch with bodies like ENUSP (European Network of Users and Survivors of Psychiatry) and the UN. We admire Facebook pages Critical Voices Network and Mental Health Discussions Edinburgh. The idea basically is to mould public and political opinion and create the conditions for more radical change. Our aim is the emancipation of mental patients.

The activities of IMPERO have been well structured. Our members are all friends. We did not bite off more than we could chew. We could continue happily for another 30 years. But God will call many of us home long before that.