JlolSenior Contributor
In (private) hospital for severe depression and things don't seem right. Can anyone shed some light on this?
Hi all,
A little while ago I decided to take the plunge and try to get admitted to a private mental health hospital. I was able to do this only after learning about the one-off mental health services waiver with private health insurance. As such this a once in a life time opportunity for me.
I've been here a week now and things just don't seem right. I'd like to hear about others experiences and opinions, and see if maybe my expectations were not correct.
The main thing I am concerned about is lack of any services or attention. My treatment consists of getting TMS (fine) and seeing a psychiatrist for about 15 minutes every other day where we just talk about the TMS and medications. The rest of the time I just sit around in my room or go to a few pass-the-time activities like board games or trivia.
There is no psychology or counselling. In fact there is no one to talk to at all, except the brief contact you have with the psychiatrist. The closest I get to seeing a psychologist is by doing a group day program in which one psychologist leads a group of 15 - 20 people following a worksheet. To me at least, it's all very obvious and general stuff and not at all personalised to your needs.
I have found no one to actually talk about my problems to. I kept asking the nurses who said the best thing I could do was try to arrange a telehealth appointment with an outside psychologist. I've had to call LifeLine a few times when I've been very, very down because there is just no one to talk to here at all. At one point I was in tears of depression and stress in the communal area and the only person to show me compassion was a kindly older patient.
My perception of these kinds of places and this kind of treatment was that I would have both a psychiatrist and a psychologist I would see often who would work together to put together an intensive mental health care plan for me. I would do both group psychology work, as well as regularly see both the psychologist and psychiatrist. It would be intense, but I would work hard, and if I felt overwhlemed to the point of needing to call LifeLine there would be at least someone to talk to. I thought, for the cost of $20,000 for my 3 week admission, this would be reasonable expectation.
As it stands I could have simply gotten much cheaper TMS as an outpatient.
Am I wrong in expecting more from a full-time in patient experience than just TMS and broad, impersonal group activities?
