Social workers’ perspectives on the recovery-oriented mental health practice in Tshwane, South Africa

ABSTRACT

The challenge facing the mental health field today is the lack of knowledge related to interventions and services that will help people recover from severe mental health problems. In addition, the reluctance of social workers to embrace the recovery-oriented mental health practice is attributed to their lack of knowledge. Hence, they regard recovery in mental health as misleading and unrealistic.The article provides the findings on the social workers’ lack of knowledge and understanding of the recovery-oriented mental health practice. The social workers are based in non-governmental organizations in Tshwane, South Africa. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to gather data from social workers. Findings confirmed the lack of knowledge regarding the recovery-oriented approach, which has not yet been implemented in South Africa. Mental health services continue to be informed by the traditional medical model.

KEYWORDS:

• Mental health
• practice
• recovery
• recovery-oriented practice
• recovery principles
• social workers

Acknowledgments

The author wishes to thank all social workers from NGOs working with people with mental health disabilities for taking part and providing valuable information in the current study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Additional information

Funding

The author was responsible for the funding of the study.