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Gender, asylum seekers and mental distress: challenges for mental health social work
- Author:
- CHANTLER Khatidja
- Journal article citation:
- British Journal of Social Work, 42(2), 2012, pp.318-334.
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
This paper sets out to describe how UK legislation governing asylum policy may lead to the marginalisation and mental health distress of asylum seekers. The paper covers 4 areas. First, it starts by briefly setting out the main policy framework, picking out 3 key issues in relation to adult asylum seekers: poverty, dispersal and detention. It explores the mental health implications of each of these and argues that these policies replicate known risk factors in mental ill health. Second, much of the psychiatric literature relating to asylum seekers and refugees draws on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as the key diagnostic category. The paper argues that PTSD has to be problematised and highlights the importance of maintaining a social model of understanding mental distress and developing it further to include insecure immigration status in our models of understanding mental distress. Third, it considers the specific issues facing women asylum seekers and illustrates how an analysis at the intersection of gender, mental distress and asylum is essential. Finally, the paper argues that, to respond more effectively in this complex area of work, interventions at a practitioner, organisational and societal level are required. It concludes by highlighting the key challenges to mental health social work, and suggesting 8 key ways forward.