The future of healthcare management relies upon the abilities of skilled leaders to effectively tackle current problems and plan for challenges that might emerge in the future. Currently, healthcare leaders are faced with challenges ranging from the ethics relating to healthcare delivery to technological advancement. Mental health is especially critical in discussions on the improvement of healthcare management due to the increasing awareness on the matter. The imperative for the identification of current and future challenges in mental health management emanates from the need to come up with policies and methods to continually improve healthcare delivery and integrate processes that take into account priority areas. Hence, these paper assesses the current and future challenges in healthcare management, more specifically relating to mental health and the role of healthcare leaders in managing these challenges.
Challenges in the Healthcare System
Stigma is a major source of concern for healthcare leaders seeking to improve access to mental health treatment. An estimated 70% of mentally ill people worldwide lack access to treatment due to low levels of knowledge and discrimination (Wainberg et al. 2017). Prejudice against mentally ill people effectively delays or prevents these patients from accessing treatment hence adversely affecting outcomes. Interventions to reduce stigma relating to mental health need to cover various areas including knowledge improvement and ease of access to the treatment services. Knowledge changes promise to create positive attitudes towards mental illness and reduce stigma towards people affected by mental health. The issue of stigma relates to societal perspectives towards mental illness as well as the level of knowledge acquired by individuals. Consequently, ending stigma directed at patients requires approaches that take into account attitude change in the society.
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Although great strides have been achieved in recent decades with regard to mental health and substance use disorders, numerous literature gaps persist on the issue. Substance use is associated with numerous mental health risks including depression, schizophrenia, and anxiety (Baingana, Al'Absi, Becker & Pringle, 2015). The increasing health risks associated with substance use highlight the need for further research on the matter. Research on the relationship between substance use and mental health disorders has not produced conclusive results with some studies associating the two with either genetic, environmental or social factors (Baingana, Al'Absi, Becker & Pringle, 2015). Hence, interventions focus on the individual's needs of the patient.
Despite the gaps in research on mental illness, social media is emerging a new avenue for knowledge acquisition by people affected by mental health disorders. Technological advancement exposes patients to forums where they discuss their conditions and provide support for each other. These forums, however, introduce a new risk in mental health management as patients receive unsolicited advice from other which increases the probability of erroneous or misleading information (Naslund, Aschbrenner, Marsch & Bartels, 2016). Misinformation in this new age of technology is likely to continue as people continue to spend more time of their phones and computers. Considering that healthcare leaders have limited control on the type of information that patients receive through these forums, the chances for negative health outcomes due to this exposure will increase.
Impact of Healthcare Challenges on Organizational Leaders
Healthcare leaders promote ideas aimed at improving healthcare delivery through innovative methods of developing interventions and overcoming the unique challenges experienced in healthcare. In relation to the above-mentioned challenges, the roles of healthcare leaders have to be adjusted to meet the needs associated with the challenges. The stigma associated with mental health disorders undermines the efforts of organizational managers to increase the number of people who have access to treatment. Typically, the leaders plan and implement health promotion programs that aim to increase awareness on mental health and dispel myths and misconceptions about mental disorders. Prejudice towards mentally ill people is unwelcomed in the quest to improve access to treatment and change societal attitudes on the issue. The stigma is also a challenge to organizational managers to develop methods of approaching the treatment of mental disorders with knowledge of the patient's attitude towards the condition. Certainly, stigma is not only a concern for healthcare leaders but also a hindrance to efforts of improving treatment approaches.
Research gaps in mental disorders continually limit the development of policies aimed at improving healthcare delivery in the case of mental illness. Organizational leaders are the policy makers and implementers in healthcare management. Policies are informed by past and current research on mental health with a focus on developing policies that take into account the overall needs of the patients and their families. Limited or inconclusive findings on mental disorders reduce the ability of the leaders to create policies that effectively address the concerns of the patients and other stakeholders. The emergence of social media platforms as avenues where patients exchange ideas on mental disorders introduces new perspectives into the roles of healthcare leaders. While the roles of these leaders were previously limited to the interaction between the organization and the patient and the family members, they now have to ensure that the information that patients access does no negative impact on the interventions applied. Such developments point to the need for organizational leaders to keep track with technological changes and determine the way that they influence knowledge on mental health.
Leadership Skills in Healthcare
Importantly, the leadership skills of the managers have to suit their positions and prove effective in overcoming the challenges associated with mental health at present and in the future. A critical leadership skill in the current healthcare setting is innovation. Innovative leaders have the ability to conceptualize issues within their environment and come up with solutions that are reflective of their leadership abilities. Innovative leaders can effectively develop avenues for health promotion to increase knowledge of mental health. Technology can prove pivotal in helping change the attitudes of populations towards mental disorders. Social media platforms are effective in reaching out to millions of people at low costs. The leaders can thus come up with messages that capture the attention of their audiences as they seek to create attitude change.
Organizational leaders should have the intelligence and drive to efficiently utilize research findings in creating interventions for mental health patients (Kumar, 2013). Evidence-based practice requires the development of interventions based on the reliable available information and its suitability to the condition. The managers thus have to create a culture of evidence utilization by leading from the front within the organization. The same level of intelligence is applicable in carrying out research on mental illness to fill the literature gaps on the topic. Since research findings on mental disorders and substance use seem limited, the leaders should focus on these key areas to help develop interventions that will be useful in the future.
Planning and vision are necessary for steering the organization to improved levels of care delivery. Visionary leadership focuses on continuous improvement while taking into account the needs of various stakeholders. The leaders have to focus on increasing awareness of mental health by correctly laying plans that convince others to develop positive attitudes towards mental disorders. Through such visionary leadership, the organizations set an example with regard to its handling of patients with mental disorders. Visionary leadership also helps in the acquisitions of professionals to care for patients and create an enabling environment that aids in improving outcomes.
References
Baingana, F., Al'Absi, M., Becker, A. E., & Pringle, B. (2015). Global research challenges and opportunities for mental health and substance-use disorders. Nature , 527 (7578), S172.
Kumar, R. D. (2013). Leadership in healthcare. Anaesthesia & Intensive Care Medicine , 14 (1), 39-41.
Naslund, J. A., Aschbrenner, K. A., Marsch, L. A., & Bartels, S. J. (2016). The future of mental health care: peer-to-peer support and social media. Epidemiology and psychiatric sciences , 25 (2), 113-122.
Wainberg, M. L., Scorza, P., Shultz, J. M., Helpman, L., Mootz, J. J., Johnson, K. A., ... & Arbuckle, M. R. (2017). Challenges and opportunities in global mental health: a research-to-practice perspective. Current psychiatry reports , 19 (5), 28.
