AstraZeneca - Seroquel - Big Pharma's Evil Ways - BBC does great job of covering a hugely important, and complex story

AstraZeneca - Seroquel - Big Pharma & Their Evil Ways - The BBC does great job of covering a hugely important, and complex story.

A hat tip goes out to pharmagossip for bringing this radio show to my attention.

This show is well worth the time spent listening.

As for those out there who have not followed along with events surrounding Big Pharma's crimes against humanity and society. This program should give you a glimpse into a vary dark and seedy industry making 100's of billions of dollars on the avoidable suffering, damage, and even death of patients all in the name of corporate profits and greed.

AstraZeneca 'suppressed' drug test data <------link to broadcast

For further interesting reading on this topic, I have added this recent article @ Pharmalot where the AZ executive used in the BBC radio program, and the authors of a new abstract are commenting.

The Rise Of Marketing-Based Medicine

Link to abstract pdf file from "Evidence-based Medicine to Marketing-based
Medicine: Evidence from Internal Industry Documents" --> (see here)

Judi Chamberlin - civil rights hero passes @ age 65

Advocate For People With Mental Illnesses Dies

Advocate For People With Mental Illnesses Dies

and from a friend - accessdenied-livingwithms - remembering-judi

______________________________________________

NPR reports by Joseph Shapiro

January 19, 2010

Judi Chamberlin, who died this weekend at age 65, was a civil rights hero from a civil rights movement you may have never heard of. She took her inspiration from the heroes of other civil rights movements to start something she liked to call Mad Pride — a movement for the rights and dignity of people with mental illness.

It started in 1966, when Chamberlin was 21 years old and seeing her doctor because she was dealing with a deep depression. "After a while, he suggested I sign myself into a hospital because I was just not functioning, I was so depressed. And I just thought, 'Oh a hospital's a place where you get help.' And you know, I'd been in hospitals for surgery and things like that, and didn't think of it as having anything to do with your fundamental rights. So I just said, 'OK, I'll try it.' "

Chamberlin told her story in a 2006 interview with Will Hall, host of Madness Radio, a program by people like Chamberlin who call themselves "psychiatric survivors."

"And very quickly, [I] found out that once you sign papers to go in on a voluntary basis, but then you can't leave when you want to leave, which was absolutely shocking to me," she said.

She got out of that state hospital and moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, where she lived with other people who'd been diagnosed with mental illness but who'd then gotten government money to develop their own treatments. She recovered and eventually moved to Boston, where she started working with other former American patients who wanted to change the system. They called themselves the Mental Patients Liberation Front.

"When I arrived at this storefront in Cambridge, Mass., I was a senior Harvard student, had been locked up five times, so I was referred by Harvard to volunteer there," recalls David Oaks, who came to the group in 1976. "And I walked in, and it was a little radical ragtag group, Mental Patients Liberation Front. And Judi was right in the thick of folks, just really warm, community organizer."

Oaks now runs his own advocacy group, MindFreedom International. Chamberlin was a mentor. "One thing she immediately helped teach a lot of people was basic 101 about mental health liberation: That we're equal; that we have rights."

One thing she immediately helped teach a lot of people was basic 101 about mental health liberation: That we're equal; that we have rights.

- David Oaks, of MindFreedom International

Chamberlin put that basic thinking into a book called On Our Own, which published in 1978. In it, she argued that, as she'd experienced in Canada, just the ability to have some say in your own treatment was a key part of making that treatment work.

Chamberlin's book became a manifesto for other patients. But it influenced lots of people in the mental health establishment, too. Today, notes Oaks, it's common for people with mental illness to have a say. "Most U.S. states now have an office of mental health consumer affairs or something to hear the voice of mental health clients," says Oaks. "And it certainly is people like Judi that did that."

Robert Whitaker, the author of Mad in America, a history of the treatment of people with mental illness in America, says Chamberlin was "a seminal figure in the rise of the consumer movement." She was able to get across the patient's point of view in a way that was strong, but also clear. And that appealed to people in the mental health field who were often the target of her criticism.

"Judi was fierce, incredibly fierce," says Whitaker. "And by that I mean she knew her mind, she spoke her mind, and she didn't worry if she offended people who were listening."

Chamberlin, he says, was irreverent, "brilliant" and "a joy to be around." He also says she was "incredibly brave," because "it obviously takes a lot of bravery to confront a society that's had a different belief before."

Chamberlin told people with mental illness that they were, like everyone else, people with quirks and differences, but with strengths and abilities, too. She wanted people to reclaim the description "mad" as something that was OK.

"She changed it from a word that was a pejorative word," says Whitaker. "That was saying to the world at large: We are worthy individuals, and our minds our worthy, and they're to be respected."

Chamberlin even used "mad pride" as her e-mail address. "And you can see the historical echoes with 'black pride' as well," says Whitaker. "It absolutely followed in the footsteps of the civil rights movement."

Chamberlin traveled the world as an advocate, even in the months before her death. She worked at Boston University on mental health issues and started a center with federal funding to support other psychiatric survivors.

More recently, Chamberlin faced another illness: lung disease. And last year, when her insurance company told her she'd exhausted her hospice benefit, she faced going into a nursing home. She started a blog she called Life as a Hospice Patient about her fight to die at home.

Late Saturday night, she died as she wished: at home, in her favorite chair, surrounded by friends and family.

_________________________________

David Oaks @MindFreedomIntl tribute

More Links -

judi-chamberlin-humanitarian-activist

Passing of Judi Chamberlin

Judi Chamberlin, 1944-2010

Judi Chamberlin: 30 October 1944 to 16 January 2010

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122706192

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judi_Chamberlin

http://voices-of-recovery-schizophrenia.blogspot.com/2008/01/judi-chamberlin-developing-recovery.html

http://www.narpa.org/chamberlin.htm

http://multimedia.boston.com/m/22341724/a-wish-to-die-at-home.htm


http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.power2u.org/images/JudiChamberlin.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.power2u.org/judi-chamberlin.html&usg=__6JUoAfsqhEOCsZfzRTnGNEAJVFI=&h=153&w=104&sz=7&hl=nl&start=10&um=1&tbnid=VkB9nhEpcxpI7M:&tbnh=96&tbnw=65&prev=/images%3Fq%3Djudi%2Bchamberlin%2Bhospice%26hl%3Dnl%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1

Thank you Judi, you will be missed, may you rest in peace

Washington State DSHS - Western State Hospital - A Shoeless Joe Jackson Story in Western's Field of Dreams

Sometimes in the hardest of times, in the mist of unbearable circumstance, through the tears of sorrow, the howling wails of injustice, you must stop to take a deep breath of cool fresh air, force a smile through the thickest of hazy fog, and find a tiny bit of laughter within the muffled darkness

Went to visit Lindsay today @ WSH. Lindsay wasn't being verbal, but appeared quite happy we were there to visit, giving her mom a big hug and myself a smiling grin of approval.


We had brought the usual yummy snacks, some play doe, a large box of crayons, and a coloring book with puzzles and quiz's in it to help keep her mind occupied.


I really cherish these days when she is making eye contact, engaging us in her accepted forms of connection, giving her encouraging words and gestures.


We colored and made play doe faces on the table ( Picasso-Esq in digression would best describe my artistic talents in this area), we laughed, made are usual silly faces, shared grins, sang out-loud ( at least I did, picture a howling cartoon coyote for this one), and just tried to make the short time we have together really matter.


Today was enjoyable, continuing to foster all the support and hope we can muster under these obviously constrained circumstances for Lindsay.


Then the bedazzlement of bombs bursting in air came a frenzy of staff theatrics.

WSH does not allow photographs to be taken on their secretive grounds, so I found this photo of accepted standards of care employed within their institution that best depicts how staff was reacting to our visit today

As an announcement was overhead on the intercom system declaring "the following people are eligible" for the 4pm "fresh air break". six names were called out (from an estimated thirty patients on this ward only six were eligible) with the last name on the list being Lindsay. ( I thought this a bit odd since the only time I have heard the intercom used during my visits there was to call someone directly to the nurses station or for scheduled medication time ).


An "unnamed" WSH staff entered the visiting area and proclaimed "she's been outside 2 times already", the staff said.


"what shoes did she wear?", I asked as her advocate.


"i don't know that wasn't my shift, they told me, i don't know", the person said.


Stephany opened the door of the visiting room and walked to the nurse's station and said, "do you have any shoes?". To the best of my knowledge and experience from frequenting many other institutions, that a hospital does provides athletic shoes with Velcro straps to patients as standard practice.



Knowing Lindsay arrived to the WSH on 12-21-09 in plastic slip on sandals (those sandals are no where to be found), and the only thing she owns personally at present are pink fluffy slippers (which we brought her and have not been seen since she was moved to her new ward).


"what size does she wear?" the correct size is communicated to them and they say they only have one pair of shoes left, and it was not her size, too small.


Though they brought them to her anywise as they watched Lindsay struggle to get the shoes on her feet as they were obviously far too small.


"we won't have more shoes for one month. doesn't she have shoes at home?", the person said. (one month without shoes and another to go I catch myself mumbling under my breath. Are they actually serious? Is this stupid excuse number ?WHAT? for reasons we "WSH" will not give patients outdoor/fresh air time).


(Lindsay hasn't lived at home for 2 years and the shoes she had on her feet we bought her were missing when the police found her at 1am in October 1/2 clothed and lost, in 40 degree weather, story goes on from there, we all know it by now right?)


They rushed her to get the shoes on, the patients were waiting! oh, too late! another person walks in the visiting room, i asked where her pink slippers are, as i have not seen them on her feet since she arrived there, and wondered if they were lost. that staff went and unlocked her closet, found the slippers, telling us my daughter's key didn't work for her belongings closet. does she have a new key or not? what about getting her things out?(I was feeling hurried, pressured and anxious by this flood of demanding stimulus about this time to be frankly honest; so I can only imagine how Lindsay was feeling with her need to have TIME TO PROCESS her thoughts).

I believe this depicts the staff at this juncture in our visit, at least the one that weren't sitting behind the nurses station observing!

--

if she went outside 2 times before today it was in barefoot in the wet? Or are we talking about a quick trip out to the "field of dreams" aka outdoor time so to speak?


the patient has no shoes, could that now be handled? we have not even begun to talk about a treatment plan or mental health wellness goals, we are at the stage of what? take her outside? shoes? what shoes? locker key? what locker key?

Have no fears, I believe this is a top secret photo taken of the WSH treatment team hard at work on Lindsay active individual treatment and care plan, while discussing how it will be implemented to best meet her level of care, her least restrictive goals, individualized acuity needs, and accommodate her disabilities throughout her stay and beyond.

We have decided to lower our expectations and walk into the "field of dreams" where people have high professional standards, as high as if they were actually a patient being treating by themselves.



---

Lindsay actually was able to enjoy our visit today, next we will be bringing her a ball to take outside, someday soon we hope to join her on the court, take her for walks on the grounds, and even bring her dog Koda across the street to the Doggy Park for some quality time with Lindsay, and we hope they have found WSH issued shoes by then?, because what if we weren't there to notice she had no shoes on? are they honestly saying they walked her through hallways and out to the outdoor enclosed area barefoot in the rain and cold?


I have to wonder if a patient @ WSH needed something really important, maybe even something critical to health; how exactly would that be handled effectively by this team?


I have shake my head in honest disbelief at this juncture.


I know, I know, don't be Anti-Western after all, right!


This post is based on similar perceptions you can read over @ wsh-field-of-dreams-and-shoeless-joe

Washington State DSHS - Western State Hospital - Lindsay's Journey Part 2 - Making Your Voice Heard

WE ALL MUST BREAK DOWN THESE COLD STONE WALLS, ONE BRICK AT A TIME, ONE PATIENT AT A TIME, UNTIL JUSTICE PREVAILS, HUMANENESS TRIUMPHS, AND THE FLOWERS BLOOM IN ALL THEIR GLORY ONCE MORE DIGNIFIED IN THE WARM SUNLIGHT OF THIS LIFE JOURNEY

DSHS

Click here to contact the Governor of WA state, via email, written letter or phone call.

I would kindly ask that you please show civility in your correspondence

My letter to the Governor January 17, 2010

_______________________________________________________


Dear Governor,

The right to an active therapeutic treatment process including individualized treatment plans and the execution of those written plans (including outdoor time daily) should be mandatory for patients at Western State Hospital without arbitrary point based achievement systems.

Patients should not have to earn the right to an active treatment process or outside time based on a point based level system (which in many cases are arbitrary and beyond the capabilities/capacity of special needs and PDD patients).

Patients should be able to go outside whether they smoke or not, whether they have a level or not. Patients, in fact should have a daily outdoor time required as part of their active treatment plan. Even convicted felons in institutional settings are given fresh air/outdoor time mandated by law.

My Friend, Lindsay, age 22 with a diagnosis of developmentally delayed and mental illness label is a current patient at WSH. I have been told on multiple occasions there was not funding or staff to take her and other patients outside, that she could not go outside during a medication change, and that she was a flight risk so was moved to an area, with an enclosed outdoor area accessible to her, and after 5 days she still has not gone outside. If fact I suspect professional staff at Western State Hospital are now acting in retribution against Lindsay for efforts made on her behalf by family and advocates.

It does not take a medical degree to conclude that the longer a person is locked up in a controlled and artificially limiting environment, there would be increased agitation events, a digression in functioning capabilities/status, and that this in itself runs counterproductive to the least restrictive orders and law relating to civilly committed patients at Western State Hospital.

I would hope you would take a moment to imagine what it might be like being locked away in a very constricted environment with 30 other patients with varying degrees of Mental Health conditions without an active treatment process or fresh air time for over a month.

Then, remember this hospitalization is the result of a transfer from another hospital, so the outdoor time (lack thereof) is actually nearly 5 months. It appears that using a civil right to fresh air is being arbitrarily used against patients, which is degrading and inhumane.

Common sense and moral humanity should prevail at the end of the day with this dire situation that is presented in this letter. Imagine if you will how good it would feel for you to go outside in the fresh air and sun light after being confined in an artificially restrictive environment such as to be locked up on a psychiatric ward at Western State Hospital.

This appears to be unconscionable treatment and care being provided to an honorable young woman that has been sent to WSH for being a vulnerable citizen, a probable victim of harm and exploitation from society.

We must as stewards and servants of this State, provide and insist upon the highest minimum standards of humane care for some of the most vulnerable citizen populations.

We are spending more dollars and expend more resources to prison and forensic populations than we do on these civilly committed and needy in-firmed individuals. I would present to you governor that this must change.

All patients (including Lindsay) must be given active treatment options and services that effectively lead to wellness and assimilation back into our communities. We must demand accountability and oversight to make sure this comes to pass by DSHS and Clinicians before further damage and suffering is inflicted upon our citizens.

Simple request for time outdoors, to run and play and feel once again like a valued and dignified human being should not be met by loved ones with excuses, resistance, and retribution by care providers. After all, do we have to be reminded that these valued human beings are not prisoners of the state or have committed any crime other than being simply determined ill?

I would ask you to consider directly contacting WSH and DSHS, while speaking to them about current conditions within and outside institutional facilities. I would ask you to speak to them about effective treatments, accountability for standards of care & results, converse about more community resources and support systems, and speak about the lack of community based care and housing for these patients virtually locked within a poorly constructed revolving door modality and system.

It’s now time to review all aspects of DSHS services from top to bottom, and to begin thinking outside the traditional institutional boxes for effective solutions that quite possibly could provide more, better, and higher quality care with less expenditure.

I would like thank you for your time and attention regarding these matters,

Stan -------

Lindsay’s friend and advocate

_________________________________________________

Washington State DSHS - Western State Hospital - The love that can bring down old stone walls -Lindsay's Journey

Vintage Photo late 1800's

WE ALL MUST BREAK DOWN THESE COLD STONE WALLS, ONE BRICK AT A TIME, ONE PATIENT AT A TIME, UNTIL JUSTICE PREVAILS, HUMANENESS TRIUMPHS, AND THE FLOWERS BLOOM IN ALL THEIR GLORY ONCE MORE DIGNIFIED IN THE WARM SUNLIGHT OF THIS LIFE JOURNEY

In my last post I shared some of the basic human rights and level of care patients at Western State Institution are denied on a regular basis. Since that time the DSHS headquarters and the Washington State Attorney General’s office have hit this site and other related sites. They have been made keenly aware of this situation @ Western State Institution.

So let us open up this can of political worms here for all the public to see. Lindsay, not unlike thousands of deemed mentally ill in the State of Washington that are not receiving either humane or effective care. The sad truth of this dire situation is that the entire system is so fragmented, discombobulated, and corrupted by poor management with a limited/constraining modality that it is incapable of serving or meeting the basic needs of the population it espouses to help/treat/care for.

In this system proactive advocates and families looking out for the best interest, and caring about patient’s rights/care are often viewed by DSHS and Western State Institution as a threat, the enemy, and as an obstacle that must be silenced at all cost (it would be nice if DSHS held to their own printed standards of family involvement in the treatment process). Yet, as we have seen time and time again, words without action and accountability mean absolutely nothing in government or their ingrained institutions.

I have personally seen, experienced, and bear witness to this unavoidable sad fact and truth about the failing and cruel Washington State Mental Health System. The unfortunate truth is DSHS serves but a single master; with that being an entrenched, greedy, and wasteful bureaucratic beast within itself.

From what I have seen so far by Washington State DSHS in Olympia is an inability for them to investigate themselves or advocate on behalf of Western State Institution patients and family members based on the factual basis they also run the residential care facility in her story that placed Lindsay in grave danger. They appear much more concerned about circling their wagons and protecting themselves from public scrutiny, Western State Institution, inhumane policies, and the DSHS engrained political/professional elite, in my honest opinion based on direct observation and experience.

The following links will guide you through a journey of hope, love, pain, commitment, despair, heartbreak, struggle, and frustration. They really should be mandatory reading for anyone that has or may ever have a loved one entering the Washington State Mental health system at all levels.

I challenge each of you to take this journey along with Lindsay through her mother’s poignant living words. I believe you (as I have) will be as concerned and devastated by this callous/broken system which has forgotten that history, civilization, fate, and even a final spiritual destiny itself someday will surely judge us all by how we treat and care for the most vulnerable, innocent, disadvantaged, and quite possibly the most endearing segments of our population.

(Arranged from current to oldest in order and is not all inclusive)

http://www.furiousseasons.com/archives/2010/01/lindsay_needs_to_go_outdoors.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/fresh-air-smoke-breaks-and-maybe-aclu.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/concrete-and-stones.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-day-new-ward.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/western-state-hospital-civil-commitment.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/washington-state-revolving-door-mental.html

http://www.furiousseasons.com/archives/2010/01/some_thoughts_for_western_state_hospital_dshs.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/top-100-state-workers-one-psychiatrist.html

Furious Seasons,Some Thoughts For Western State Hospital, DSHS,Philip Dawdy reporting

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/federal-report-casts-dark-cloud-over.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2010/01/destination-unknown.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/golden-moments.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/superior-court-answer-to-keep.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/changes-to-ensure-quality-care-in-state.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/crescent-moon-left-open-sky-right.html

http://www.furiousseasons.com/archives/2009/12/stephany_linds_lose_their_fight_with_washington_states_mental_health_system.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/i-hope-she-knows-i-love-her.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/this-is-your-golden-moment.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/choices.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/standing-alone-in-no-mans-land.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/rising-sunset.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/searching-for-my-memories.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/poignant-part-of-prosecuting-testimony.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/believe.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/poignant-eloquent-gift-of-dignity-and.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/complaints.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/how-it-works-i-go-with-grace-of-god.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/be-still.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/sweet-days-of-summer.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/at-cafe-with-view.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/12/taloned-grip.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/11/rules-boxes-and-piazza.html

http://bipolarsoupkitchen-stephany.blogspot.com/2009/11/raven-and-cooking.html

The Lindsay writings continue back through this journey beyond this last link back to August 2009 in two separate psych hospitals (just click blog label “In the Psych Ward” for much more)

____________________________________________________________

TO BE CONTINUED

UN ( United Nations) and WHO have an idea - Tax the World to Feed Pharma

U.N.'s World Health Organization Eyeballing Global Tax on Banking, Internet Activity

The Unitied Nations General Assembly leaders meeting to discuss taxing the world

I know this sounds absolutely absurd and incredibly insane, but this is an exclusive report from Fox News

U.N.'s World Health Organization Eyeing Global Tax

_______________________________________________

U.N.'s World Health Organization Eyeing Global Tax on Banking, Internet Activity

Friday, January 15, 2010
By George Russel

The World Health Organization (WHO) is considering a plan to ask governments to impose a global consumer tax on such things as Internet activity or everyday financial transactions like paying bills online.

Such a scheme could raise "tens of billions of dollars" on behalf of the United Nations' public health arm from a broad base of consumers, which would then be used to transfer drug-making research, development and manufacturing capabilities, among other things, to the developing world.

__________________________________________

I really encourage you all to read this whole article by following the link above. This smells of a huge Pharma corruption give away once more, and another cash for favors deal @ the "UN" and 'WHO".

Of course we all know how clean and void of corruption those people @ the UN are right! (laughing, but not all that funny in real life terms)

If you would like to see how "WHO" helped Pharma create the H1N1 pandemic and profit quite handsomely you can go here --> Was The Swine Flu - H1N1 Pandemic just marketing hoax to promote flu vaccines and here -->SWINE FLU H1N1 = Fraud? Is this Big Pharma creatin...

When will we all decide to say "enough is enough" with this criminal madness, and force them to STOP.

SWINE FLU H1N1 = Fraud? Is this Big Pharma creating scary disease for profit?

I wrote a post about this topic before here --> Was The Swine Flu - H1N1 Pandemic just marketing hoax to promote flu vaccines

Now the controversy grows as news accounts and evidence starts trickling in. The following are a couple of You-tube videos really worth watching. You might ask "why should I care?" there are tens of billions of reasons you have paid for, not counting the risk to your health.

The Failure we all pay for - Western State Hospital and Washington State DSHS

The Failure we all pay for - Western State Hospital and Washington State DSHS

Photo credit to Dan DeLong / P-I

As a caring advocate for those labeled mentally ill, I am astounded by the callous lack of compassion and care being provided by Washington State DSHS and Western State Institution (using the word "hospital" in this particular case would be misleading and disingenuous unfortunately).

It is far past the time for a disjointed, failed, and antiquated mental health system to begin to address patients real needs with humane basic care and human rights.

• It's time for those whose charge is providing adequate care to some of society's most vulnerable populations to stop making excuses to our society and patents for not doing their publicly funded jobs.

• It's time to start treating patients, their families, and friends with the dignity, sensitivity, direct involvement, and with the respect they so rightfully deserve.

• It’s time to start questioning and holding a government agency that receives an estimated $450 a day (that's almost 165 thousand dollars a year per patient) to provide treatment to patients with accountability for solid measurable results.
  
• It time to provide community based housing and support to patients which shows better results and is much more cost effective.

• It's time to tell our elected representatives that all the talk means absolutely nothing without direct substantive action (how long do we have to hear about the need for more community based treatment, services, and housing from politicians until this actually happens in real terms?)

• It is time to start treating the patients DSHS serve not only with dignity and as equal valued status citizens. It's far past time for doctors and other civic providers of services to stop treating the suffering as prisoners with a less than humane superior/authoritarian modality and attitudes.

• Its past time to provide individually based board based and detailed treatment modalities outside of simply imprisonment and medication.
  
• It’s past time for real transparency and accountability within these institutions.
  
• No longer will hiding behind locked doors serve the needs/demands of the public and patients.

• It's past time that patients are provided independent advocates that can hold institutions and providers accountable for their rights, treatments, and reasonable standards of care.

I have left just a few links below as examples of a broken and inhumane system still being provided to this day in Washington State. It is past time each of us to demand better from those paid to serve us as public servants.

Please make your voice heard

________________________________________

A 'gravely disabled' mental health care system

>A 'gravely disabled' mental health care system

Federal Report Rips Western State Hospital- Patient Death a “Preventable Failure”

Patient Death a “Preventable Failure”

Women say they were raped as children in state psychiatric hospital

raped-as-children-in-state-psychiatric-hospital

Western State Hospital Discharging Patients to “Unsafe Places”

Patient Dumping

________________________________________________

From the soulful sepulcher blog - an important message and call to action I hope everyone that cares will respond too.

Psychiatrists Among Top Paid State Employees:Austin Jenkins (2009-10-29)

Listen to NPR in the link above:

"On Ward C-7 the day starts with a treatment team meeting.

Nurse: "We're going to start with J.O. this morning. Anxious to go to groups, he is visible on the ward, he's taking his medications "Nurse Vicki Kallahan-Storwick briefs Dr. Daniel Ruiz and the team on the status of the patients.

Ruiz follows up with the diagnosis.Dr. Daniel Ruiz: "This gentleman is new on the ward. He came with significant psychotic symptoms "And a treatment plan for each patient.

Ruiz has been a psychiatrist at Western State for eight years.

He came here straight out of residency at the University of Washington. It's a second career in medicine for him. Before becoming a psychiatrist, Ruiz was a general physician in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

His path to psychiatry began with a personal story.Dr. Daniel Ruiz: "I do have a brother with schizophrenia."

---
January 6, 2010

Treatment team meeting results:

1. titrate and remove to zero, the Trileptal.

2. acknowledge and treat the current thyroid that is out of balance.

3. Dr. Ruiz will only meet with mother, weekly after today banning patient advocate from meetings due to demanding outside time.

4.WSH psychologist served court order to reside at western 180 days to patient without representation from legal department.

5. patient shall now not be allowed to have mother visit at lunch time as every day since admit on December 21, 2009 due to staff believing patient will not cooperate with them due to anticipation of mother arriving for lunch one hour visit.

6. mother was told to arrive at 4pm after groups and shift change ends.

7. patient was told to take meds, go to all groups, to earn an outside walk time with mother as a reward.

8. the advocate that was banned from future treatment team meetings today was told to write a letter to the legislator by Dr Ruiz, ( the advocate and support person patient has responded to and began to speak again as a result of hours and months of time spent with patient) if advocate didnt like the lack of funding, and proper ability to care for patient in the washington mental health system.

9. patient medications being changed is 2nd reason given to mother for not allowing outside time.

10. staff assured mother they would remind patient mom will be there at 4pm tomorrow.

11. "you're lucky she's on this ward", said Ruiz.

12. due to questioning patients right to have outside time, Dr. Ruiz deemed advocate a "detriment to patients best interest and will only meet with the mother weekly".

13. "if you take her home she loses ALL services".
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http://www.governor.wa.gov/contact/ * (click this link to email a letter or the one written here, copied and pasted) OR

Write Governor Gregoire a letter:

Governor Chris Gregoire

Office of the Governor
PO Box 40002
Olympia, WA 98504-0002
USA

Give Governor Gregoire's Office a call:

Governor's Office 360-902-4111

For relay operators for the deaf or hard of hearing,
please dial 7-1-1

Fax Governor Gregoire a letter:360-753-4110
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Dear Ms. Gregoire,

I am writing in concern of the care of a patient currently at Western State Hospital. The staff, including the doctor have voiced concern over lack of funding for mental health services in the State of Washington, USA.

It is an outrage, and unacceptable, that any patient be denied access to outside time due to lack of funding for appropriate staff to patient ratio. It is unacceptable, that advocates are not heard in meetings where the patient is top priority, and where team members discriminate toward a patient with PDD and non verbal. The patient who is duel-diagnosed with psychosis and a developmental delay, needs family support.

The base of care is funding, and this is a formal request to review the funding for mental health services in the state that you Govern, and it is a request to listen to all patients, not just 1 of approximately 800 at Western State Hospital.

Lindsay was deemed "not a danger to self, not a danger to others", but "a probable danger from society, a person who could suffer harm and exploitation" from society itself, by a King County Superior Court judge.

Lindsay, deserves more than limited/no outdoor time.
She deserves to have all members of her family and advocates be present in all meetings, she deserves far more than this system has given her to date.

She is 22 years old, and a victim of lack of funding, and proper care offered in Washington state, and it is time for her and others to be acknowledged.

Thank you for your time,

Sincerely,

________________

(YOUR NAME)

Further reference article:

Furious Seasons,Some Thoughts For Western State Hospital, DSHS,Philip Dawdy reporting