Investigating the long-term effects of a psychiatric rehabilitation programme for persons with serious mental illness in the community: a follow-up study.

摘要

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES: This is a follow-up study to investigate the long-term effects of a holistic care programme for the rehabilitation of persons with serious mental illness. Perception of help from the programme and factors relating to the outcomes of the programme will also be studied. BACKGROUND: This psychiatric rehabilitation programme in Hong Kong adopts a self-help group (SHG) approach with holistic care emphasising on the physical, psychological, social and spiritual functioning of the programme participants. DESIGN: A quantitative approach using a set of self-administered questionnaires was adopted. METHOD: Data were compared with a quasi-experimental study conducted in 2003 by Luk and Shek involving an experimental group and a control group. RESULTS: All the outcome measures of participants were similar to that of the experimental group found in last study. When compared with the control group, it was found that participants had more hope than the control subjects. Help perceived from the programme included support, encouragement, enhancement of self-confidence, spiritual assistance and reflection of values. Having a job is found to be a key factor relating to the outcomes of the programme participants. CONCLUSIONS: The programme is effective to provide some positive changes to its participants. Help is perceived by most participants and the programme is also useful to provide mutual support to participants in maintaining a job in the community, which is a paramount factor for rehabilitation. RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: A partnership model in SHG seems to be successful in providing support for the rehabilitation of persons with serious mental illness. Spiritual element should be incorporated into psychiatric rehabilitation programme to instil hope and meaningfulness of life. Nurses should be better educated in providing holistic care to individual clients and to a group.