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Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services

In this paper, we present findings from a qualitative study that explored Indigenous people’s experiences of mental health and addictions care in the context of an inner-city area in Western Canada. Using an ethnographic design, a total of 39 clients accessing 5 community-based mental health care ag...

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Autores principales: Smye, Victoria, Browne, Annette J., Josewski, Viviane, Keith, Barbara, Mussell, William
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9958899/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36833982
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20043288
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author Smye, Victoria
Browne, Annette J.
Josewski, Viviane
Keith, Barbara
Mussell, William
author_facet Smye, Victoria
Browne, Annette J.
Josewski, Viviane
Keith, Barbara
Mussell, William
author_sort Smye, Victoria
collection PubMed
description In this paper, we present findings from a qualitative study that explored Indigenous people’s experiences of mental health and addictions care in the context of an inner-city area in Western Canada. Using an ethnographic design, a total of 39 clients accessing 5 community-based mental health care agencies were interviewed, including 18 in-depth individual interviews and 4 focus groups. Health care providers also were interviewed (n = 24). Data analysis identified four intersecting themes: normalization of social suffering; re-creation of trauma; the challenge of reconciling constrained lives with harm reduction; and mitigating suffering through relational practice. The results highlight the complexities of experiences of accessing systems of care for Indigenous people marginalized by poverty and other forms of social inequity, and the potential harms that arise from inattention to the intersecting social context(s) of peoples’ lives. Service delivery that aims to address the mental health concerns of Indigenous people must be designed with awareness of, and responsiveness to, the impact of structural violence and social suffering on peoples’ lived realities. A relational policy and policy lens is key to alleviate patterns of social suffering and counter the harms that are unwittingly created when social suffering is normalized.
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spelling pubmed-99588992023-02-26 Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services Smye, Victoria Browne, Annette J. Josewski, Viviane Keith, Barbara Mussell, William Int J Environ Res Public Health Article In this paper, we present findings from a qualitative study that explored Indigenous people’s experiences of mental health and addictions care in the context of an inner-city area in Western Canada. Using an ethnographic design, a total of 39 clients accessing 5 community-based mental health care agencies were interviewed, including 18 in-depth individual interviews and 4 focus groups. Health care providers also were interviewed (n = 24). Data analysis identified four intersecting themes: normalization of social suffering; re-creation of trauma; the challenge of reconciling constrained lives with harm reduction; and mitigating suffering through relational practice. The results highlight the complexities of experiences of accessing systems of care for Indigenous people marginalized by poverty and other forms of social inequity, and the potential harms that arise from inattention to the intersecting social context(s) of peoples’ lives. Service delivery that aims to address the mental health concerns of Indigenous people must be designed with awareness of, and responsiveness to, the impact of structural violence and social suffering on peoples’ lived realities. A relational policy and policy lens is key to alleviate patterns of social suffering and counter the harms that are unwittingly created when social suffering is normalized. MDPI 2023-02-13 /pmc/articles/PMC9958899/ /pubmed/36833982 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20043288 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Smye, Victoria
Browne, Annette J.
Josewski, Viviane
Keith, Barbara
Mussell, William
Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title_full Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title_fullStr Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title_full_unstemmed Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title_short Social Suffering: Indigenous Peoples’ Experiences of Accessing Mental Health and Substance Use Services
title_sort social suffering: indigenous peoples’ experiences of accessing mental health and substance use services
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9958899/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36833982
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20043288
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