$$News and Reports$$

Jan. 11, 2017
A new study, conducted in the framework of a unique service for families at the Beer-Sheva Mental Health Center, which is affiliated with BGU’s Faculty of Health Sciences, examined the needs of families that receive its assistance. The study found that families ranked the need for "information and knowledge" highest.

The "difficulties arising from the effect of the condition of the patient on the functioning family member that asked for assistance and the functioning of other family members” and "the difficulty of dealing with the ill individual" were ranked in the middle.

Previous research has given limited attention to the needs of the family members of people with mental illness who are hospitalised in psychiatric hospitals, in spite of the tensions and difficulties that they experience. In light of the recognition of the importance of assistance to families, an innovative model of counselling and support centers for families (Mital) was developed that won an award from the Israeli Ministry of Health and serves as a model for the rest of the mental health centers in the country.

The study included the completion of a questionnaire which assessed four potential areas of assistance, and the respondents ranked the extent of their need for each of the items in the questionnaire. The study found that the highest ranked needs were items in the realm of "information and knowledge". Next came "difficulties arising from the effect of the condition of the patient on the functioning family member that asked for assistance and the functioning of other family members” and "the difficulty of dealing with the ill individual".  The lowest need was related to "the relationship with professionals and informal systems".

"We saw that the items relating to the influence of the sick individual on the personal functioning of the family member that asked for assistance, were rated higher than items relating to the effect on the functioning of other family members," says Anat Shalev, a social worker and doctoral student from the Beer-Sheva Mental Health Center, who conducted the research in collaboration with Dr. Ron Shor from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. "The items relating to relationships with professionals were rated higher than those relating to the relationship with informal systems."

The findings underscore the importance of implementing "Family-Centered Care" in psychiatric settings. Family-Centered Care focuses on the needs of family members, beyond merely as a source of assistance to support the ill individual.

Their findings were recently published in the Israeli journal "Medicine".