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Jobs and Computers

Information technology training for long-term day hospital patients

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Maurice Lipsedge
Affiliation:
Guy's Hospital, London
Angela B. Summerfield
Affiliation:
Birkbeck College, University of London
G. Lazzari
Affiliation:
Birkbeck College and Honorary Student Psychologist, Guy's Hospital
M. van Beeston
Affiliation:
Birkbeck College and Honorary Student Psychologist, Guy's Hospital
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This is a report on a project which offers long-term day hospital patients a training which will lead to paid employment on the open market. Lack of work compounds the low self-esteem of chronic psychiatric patients. They experience multiple disadvantages, including loss of status, purpose, personal identity, social contacts outside the family, and a time structure to the day. Many of these disadvantages are known to be experienced by unemployed people in the general population. In most surveys, a fifth of the unemployed report a deterioration in their mental health since being unemployed, with an increased frequency of deterioration proportional to length of time without work. Work enhances self-esteem by decreasing the degree of dependency and by allowing identification with non-patients and may influence perceived locus of control. Work provides social participation and is ‘a visible measure of normality’ for former patients.

Type
Articles
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1987

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