Mental Illness Approximately 20% - 25% of the single, adult homeless population in the United States suffers from a persistent or severe mental illness. In Chicago, about one-third of the homeless are mental patients. These mental problems are supposedly already happening to these people before they hit the streets and become homeless. The high number of mentally ill homeless people exists, in part, because they are released from institutions with nowhere to go. An estimated 1 in 4 homeless people are affected by severe mental health problems.
The number of mentally ill homeless people did not increase until the 1980's when housing expenses began to rise swiftly. In a survey from the Federal Task Force on Homelessness and Severe Mental Illness taken in 1992, it was found that only 5% - 7% of the homeless with mental disabilities needed to be institutionalized. The rest of the population was said to be capable of living in a community with helpful housing options. FIndings have indicated that homeless people with mental disorders are willing to use services that are easy to enter and that meet their perceived needs (Oakley and Dennis, 1996). However, due to a lack of treatment centers and affordable housing, the mentally ill are not able to live in these "helpful" communities.
Some mental patients end up on the streets because of a change in treatments caused by new medical developments. In the 1950's, mental patients were not allowed to leave a hospital until they were completely recovered, but by the 1970's patients were given the opportunity to check themselves out of the hospitals with nowhere to go. Doctors can also make a patient leave the hospital without full recovery. They are cruelly shoved out into the "real world" and are told to try to make a living.
Mental patients don't usually have the same skills as the average worker. If there were jobs designated for the mentally challenged that didn't require as much work as the everyday jobs that adults hold now, the mentally handicapped might possibly be able to afford a place of their own and could make a living for themselves. Unfortunately, these people don't make enough money to pay for housing and are forced into a life on the streets. It is thought that if the right to sign themselves out of the hospital were taken away from mental patients, there would not be as many mentally ill homeless people.
People with mental illness are thought to be just like those with substance abuse problems. Both groups need to go though a variety of steps to complete their recovery. These programs include carefully designed client engagement and case management, housing options, and long-term follow-up. Supportive services, treatment options, supportive housing, and meaningful daily activity are very important for the mentally impaired. If these steps are brought together with a job, or other daily activity, along with therapy access, housing can be the end result of this program as well as the end of homelessness for several individuals.
Medicaid was created in 1965 in an effort to try to help mental patients and get them off the streets. The funds from Medicaid were to help cover medical costs. Then, in 1972 SSI (Supplemental Security Income) was created to provide money for living expenses for people who can't work because of physical or mental disabilities. Often the SSI money is not enough for mental patients to maintain a home. Food stamps are given out as yet another form of assistance to help the mentally handicapped survive. Still, with all of these different outlets for money, it is not enough.
There are many approaches that can be taken to avoid a further increase in homelessness for the mentally challenged. Community-based services like PATH (Project Assistance in Transition from Homelessness) could be broadened. Currently, this program is unable to help many individuals due to the lack of funding. SSI could be increased so that living quarters could be purchased for the mentally ill homeless. However, according to a study conducted by Kaufman in 1996, the current SSI grants would have to be more than doubled to meet HUD's (Housing and Urban Development) recommendation that only 30% of the income be used for housing. The rates of housing have continued to increase over time, but the benefit levels have not, leaving mentally ill people with nowhere to go.
Shelters offer an option aside from living on the streets to homeless people. Unfortunately, shelters are not always the best places for the mentally challenegd to stay. Shelters often have very strict rules and regulations that must be follwed so that everyone has tolerable living conditions. These rules are extremely hard for the mentally handicapped to follow. Most shelters maintain that if the people staying there don't follow the rules of the shelter, they will be thrown out. The mentally challenged are among those who are often tossed back out onto the streets.
We must work together to help the mentally ill to have an independent lifestyle with the assistance of expanded, comprehensive, community-based mental health services.
