• Question: Do you think knowledge on gender, race and different cultures would be helpful in improving the emergency services sector? Do you believe it would improve general tolerance?

    Asked by anon-268754 to Parise on 7 Nov 2020.
    • Photo: Parise Carmichael-Murphy

      Parise Carmichael-Murphy answered on 7 Nov 2020:

      I really like this question, thanks for asking it!
      I do think that the emergency services sector would benefit from embracing more diverse identities and cultures and I think it could benefit society in a number of ways:
      1) a more racially diverse police force could help reduce the number of people who are criminalised based on racialised stereotypes
      2) a better awareness of the ways that people choose to identify in relation to their gender (e.g. their pronouns) across the emergency medical services could support more people to access help and support if or when they need it
      I do think that a better understanding of the way that people’s identities (especially gender and race) impacts negatively upon the way they are treated in society could help people and those working in the emergency services better relate and empathise with each other.

Comments

  • Photo: Clare

    Clare commented on :

    Amazing question, it’s why research like Parise’s is so important! The COVID-19 pandemic has also exposed why this is so important as people from Black, Asian and ethnic minority backgrounds have been affected worse.

  • Photo: anon-269724

    anon-269724 commented on :

    It should be diversity

  • Photo: Olga

    Olga commented on :

    Knowledge about race, culture, gender, intersectionality, life stages, all of it is hugely important in helping societies be more inclusive, empathic, understanding, collaborative, and of course it should inform all services, not just mental health or crisis services but education, health, leisure services, even transport. I recently read a really interesting book: Invisible Women, which explores how the data we use to create services is really biased to meet the needs of men, for example most buildings are set at 21C because in a studies mainly with men that’s the temperature they are most comfortable, women need 23C on average so we tend to be cold. The same is true for race and culture, which is way there continues to be systemic failures of services. But this is moving and change is happening at a faster pace now with responses such as Black lives matters, which is forcing us all to take a hard look at witness and privilege and how we are contributing to it, but also, crucially, how we can change it…

  • Photo: Mona-Lisa

    Mona-Lisa commented on :

    Definitely! One of the ways of acquiring knowledge in this area is by conducting independent research or reviews of existing health care services . This supports learning and informs required change .

    An example is the independent review of the Mental Health Act which published a report in December 2018. The aim of the review was to understand and make recommendations about “the disproportionate number of people from black and minority ethnicities detained under the act”.
    The report highlighted a disparity in the peoples’ experiences of mental health difficulties and treatment in the UK.
    The authors acknowledged the findings suggested a complex picture but showed that Black people got “the sharper end of treatment in the more uncomfortable ways.” ( MIND June 2018 – Discrimination in mental health services )

    Some of the report findings include;
    a) Black women experienced substantially higher rates of mental health problems than white women.
    b) Black men experienced psychosis around 10 times more frequently than white men.
    c) Black people are 40% more likely to access treatment through a police or criminal justice route,
    d) Black people were less likely to receive psychological therapies,
    e) Black people were more likely to be compulsorily admitted for treatment, more likely to be on a medium or high secure ward and be more likely to be subject to seclusion or restraint
    The report authors made a number of recommendations including calls for greater representation of African and Caribbean heritage in senior levels in mental health professions and as patient advocates as well as more research on issues leading to mental disorders in BAME communities
    Some studies on clinical decision-making have suggested that clinicians may hold negative unconscious bias towards people from BAME backgrounds which may influence their treatment decisions
    MIND in their review of the government report explored whether stereotypes of black people (especially men) being perceived as dangerous had an impact on clinicians when making decisions around compulsory admissions.

    The following references could be accessed for more information :

    1. https://www.mind.org.uk/news-campaigns/legal-news/legal-newsletter-june-2019/discrimination-in-mental-health-services/

    2.https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/778897/Modernising_the_Mental_Health_Act_-_increasing_choice__reducing_compulsion.pdf

    An example tudies . n emergency mental health services