misfitmonkey

I have a few things to say about Mental, a fairly new show on FOX that stars a:

“radically unorthodox psychiatrist who becomes Director of Mental Health Services at a Los Angeles hospital where he takes on patients battling unknown, misunderstood and often misdiagnosed psychiatric conditions.” (from show description)

My husband enjoyed watching me watch the show this past weekend, and eventually even said, “Umm… why are you watching this? It just seems to be agitating you.”

You know, the show is not really all bad and the doctors are all vaguely interesting as people, but here are some of the things that bug me about the show:

1. Why are psychiatrists the only people who seem to be working with these patients and their families?

Seriously… where are the social workers, the nurses, the aides, the occupational therapists, recreational therapists, and other various people who generally work on an inpatient psychiatric unit? More than one episode shows the main character finding family members and engaging in counseling and doing about a dozen different things that are NOT realistically carried out by the psychiatrist in a typical inpatient setting. It’s a team effort, and it’s really irritating to see my role often completely overlooked or completely misrepresented as something a doctor would do.

Psychiatrists do very important work and I work with many who are very dedicated and mindful and more than competent at what they do, but sometimes (a LOT of the time) it’s a social worker who’s rolling up sleeves and diving into a messy family situation and providing individual or family/couples therapy while the patient is on the psych unit. Did every single important character on the show have to be a doctor? *sigh*

2. Why are all of these patients diagnosed with things or experiencing things in a way that most mental health professionals NEVER see on a daily basis?

I understand the intrigue of rare disorders, but a majority of the public could greatly benefit from better exposure to more common mental illness diagnoses and the difficulties that come with those diagnoses. I would really like more typical psychiatric patients and the struggles that they have to deal with, not to mention the complicated struggles their families deal with as well.

You don’t have to go way into left field to find some really intriguing stories about mental health patients and their loved ones. My work day is completely different every day, and I almost always finish a work week with at least one story that no one would believe if they haven’t been exposed to inpatient or community mental health, so why does the show have to focus so much on rare diagnoses and exceptions to the rule? Try showing the public a more realistic and helpful look at the type of illnesses their family and friends could be struggling with on a daily basis, and there is a valuable, interesting show that people could relate to.

3. Sleeping with a patient’s immediate family member is unethical.

ESPECIALLY when you’ve interacted with that family member during the course of treatment. Enough said.

Overall, I don’t hate the show, and I’ve continued to watch it (I think I’m on the fifth episode), but it doesn’t do a very good job of accurately portraying an inpatient psychiatric unit and all of the hardworking people that spend their days working with patients and their families. They really could have done better with this show.