Opening Doors to Progress: Including People with Mental Health Conditions in Research

There is a growing need for new and useful perspectives in mental health. While standard research methods yield helpful and essential progress, calling on consumers to become involved in research opens the door to a whole array of untapped resources and otherwise hidden solutions.

People are suffering from mental illness around the world and in every walk of life. How do we best tackle these problems? Modern medicine is a surefire answer, but it is definitely not consistently available, and no one method is ever perfect. Community-based participatory research (CBPR) offers a different solution. CBPR compliments more traditional scientific research and medical management. This is research that is still typically run by academic researchers and scientists, but also includes people who live with the condition that is being studied in the research process. By including consumers in the research, we are able to find new solutions to mental health problems through the discovery of the multitudes of very personal perspectives, scenarios, and strategies. Exploration of these resources, in both scientific and community settings, can lead to improvement on many levels of mental health. People benefit first-hand through education as well as through developing better health practices. We need to make these solutions available to more people.

Over the last five years, I have become involved in this type of research. I have shared my experience and I have learned new, evidence-based skills for coping. I have found that one of the best therapies for dealing with my own mental health condition is researching my condition. I have been doing exactly that in an effort to maintain and increase wellness for my own sake, and also to help the mental health community in general. In CBPR, the benefits run both ways. Consumers, like me, can find benefits such as coping strategies while doing the research. Health professionals, educators, and academic researchers gain knowledge by working directly with people in the community that have lived with mental illness. The researchers in these projects can learn during the study itself. Later, the results of such research can lead to accessible forms of education, in different types of media, that become more available to the whole community. This can help build on practices in mental health, and offer direct treatment strategies when typical medical management is not as available.

Compared to twenty-five years ago when I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, the awareness of the importance of mental health has greatly increased. Part of this is because of the language. Of course, it is likely true that throughout periods of time, and in other regions of the world, the equivalent, or something very similar to mental health has always been sought, but just not framed as such. We are now getting to know the brain and the physical aspects much better; it goes way beyond other periods of time and in those places that these advances have not yet been able to reach. Still, over the ages, and around the world, we have developed strategies for coping. Whether these strategies are based in science, religion, or in other community wisdom, they seem to have gained much more awareness (as in mental health) even since the 1990s — at least here in Canada. Modern media and the internet have played a key role in the expansion of awareness about mental health. This has also allowed the knowledge of the community, including patient-oriented research, to evolve.

By including consumers in research, we will enable a better grasp of first-person solutions in mental health. Peer research and community involvement creates synergies with scientists, educators, and available medical management to produce the best possible chance for people with mental illness to thrive in the community.