ABSTRACT

 ABSTRACT
This is a research proposal about the extent of discrimination by age in the provision of mental health services in the UK. The research is based on the fact that although mental health service provision should be universal, there is a lot of evidence to suggest discrimination especially by age. The objective is therefore to examine the extent of available health care services for mentally ill patients as well as how the services are administered to different age groups as well as investigate the rate and degree at which patients of different age groups use medical private and public institutions to seek mental health services. Besides, the study aims to analyze the prevailing patient-doctor (or caregiver) ratio and duration against age of mentally ill patients compared to other ailments as well as investigate the rates at which patients are turned away from mental health services by caregivers and the impacts various discrimination variables on patients.

Data collection will be based on a positivist research design using quantitative data collected from a survey administered to multiple case studies selected judgmentally. The case studies are four private and four public hospitals as well as two residential or care centers of elderly and mentally sick patients. Respondents will be patients or survivors as well as caregivers of mental health services in the said case studies. Questionnaires will be the research instrument whose data will be analyzed through SPSS. The research duration is estimated for two academic years.

1.0 INTRODUCTION

1.1 Research background
Provision of health services is considered as a very important element of any stable state. Exemplary provision of health services is one of the ways that citizens develop legitimacy for their governments. Although general provision of health services has few issues, questions have always been raised about discriminations in the provision of mental health services in the UK. According to Corker et al (2013), mental health discriminations have increased stigma associated to the disease leading to severe problems among victims. Reports also indicate that many suicides have been experienced among mentally ill patients not because of their statuses of disease but stigma related to the condition. From a report by Evans-Lacko et al (2012), the greatest level of discrimination in the UK in relation to mental health services is age whereby elderly people face a lot of rejection and denial of medical services. This proposal presents a methodology and plan of a research aimed at identifying the extent of discrimination based on age in the UK.

1.2 Problem Statement and Justification
According to Rogers & Pilgrim (2014), the UK government has considered establishing legislations to outlaw discrimination by age in provision of mental health services in public institutions. This is an implication that the government acknowledges the hurdle but has no reliable mechanism to handle it amicably. As a result, inequalities in mental health between young and elderly populations in the UK continue to rise. Besides, the a mental health policy group report that the UK has about six million mentally ill patients aged less than 65 with more than 75% of them not receiving treatment for fear of being stigmatized.

However, mental health problem is wide spread especially among corporate employees who are often diagnosed of depression and anxiety (Creek, & Lougher, 2011; Lasalvia et al., 2013). Nevertheless, the UK government established a legislation requiring a compulsory treatment of mental health illness which according to Henderson, Evans-Lacko & Thornicroft (2013), is a directive that has increased stigma and that the psychotherapy services initiated by the government has no legal obligations making it vague as well as escalating age discrimination. This is despite the fact that the UK spends more than £105 billion every year to deal with mental problems (Evans-Lacko et al, 2014).

Based on this context, this dissertation will not only find out the extent of age discrimination in UK mental health services but also suggest long-term remedies to the problem among policy makers on the national health services departments. Conducting this research will be also relevant to educational institutions dealing with special needs on how to promote equity and equality in service provision irrespective of health status or demographic characteristics for a more united and prosperous country. This research also contributes to the scholarly theory in mental health, special needs education and psychology.

1.3 Hypothesis and Objectives of the Study
To investigate the extent of discrimination by age for mental health services in the UK, a number of objectives will be pursued:

To examine the extent of available health care services for mentally ill patients as well as how the services are administered to different age groups.
To investigate the rate and degr