Recovery and Empowerment of Persons with Severe Mental Disorder

Book excerpt: This book presents a narrative review of current models of recovery and empowerment on people with severe mental disorders, and the impact of these models and approaches on assistance policies. The authors review conceptual frameworks, research findings, key predictors of recovery and empowerment, evaluation instruments and criteria, and user and families' perspectives on recovery and empowerment. Contemporary ideas of recovery, often referred to as personal recovery, emerged in the USA in the 1970s and 1980s through first person accounts of the lived experience of mental health problems and through accompanying consumer and human rights movements. However, the origins of the recovery movement in mental health can be traced back over several hundred years. The books describes many of these historical influences and the roots of today's approaches to recovery. It also provides a detailed discussion of the concept of, and approach to, empowerment. Whilst acknowledging the diverse definitions of recovery and the associated challenges of its meaningful measurement, the authors also aim to engage with the concept of recovery. Many studies of recovery are helpfully brought together here for the reader, but personal recovery, as a process and outcome, should be much more central to mental health research. A diverse audience of mental health professionals, teachers, students, and researchers, will find this a valuable reference source.