La policía española ante la enfermedad mentalimpacto en las actitudes y conductas de la actuación profesional

Résumé

Introduction: Police officers have become an important part in the attention and management of patients with mental health illness, from a penal and socio-sanitary perspective. Investigations regarding the stigma of mental health illness have started to include police agencies as an implicated party in the attention of this field. On this regard, it is important to study what attitudes do police officers have towards mental illness, as if negative, they might be an obstacle to the exercise of the right of defence, and even to the protection of people who suffer them. Objectives The general objective of this study was to assess the effect of mental illness stigma among the members of the National Police Force, and its possible consequences on Police action. The specific objectives were: (1) To explore the professional contact with mental illness. (2) To evaluate the professional training given to police officers in this filed. (3) To describe the opinions held about mental health. (4) To assess the perception of legal certainty before an individual with mental disease. (5) To analyse attitudes towards mental health illness and to determine socio-demographic factors that could modify them. (6) To evaluate how mental illness labels may influence on police agents&apos; behaviour. Material and methods Cross-sectional study conducted on members of the National Police Force on occasion of being at the National Police School and the Centre for High Police Studies, following upgrading training courses. Data recruited by self-administered questionnaires, designed ad hoc to evaluate socio-demographic and work-related characteristics, training, opinions and contact with mental illness. To evaluate behaviour, there were designed 15 hypothetical police cases describing a person with schizophrenia, depression or without mental disease in different situations, and randomly distributed among participants. To analyse attitudes, a Modified Atribution Questionniare (MAQ) was applied. Statistical analysis included two parts, descriptive and inferential; significance level was set at p < 0.05. Results Sample included 927 National Police officers, subjects in all different ranks. 3 out of 4 participants are not satisfied with the training they received; more than 60% consider that training necessary. Officers&apos; contact with people with mental disease is frequent, at least once per week, and the most common contact happens when they are victims. Police officers show towards people with mental disease, compared with others whom they ignore their mental health, a great will to help, more compassionate feelings, considering them less responsible of their situation; they also show more anger and avoidance behaviour, they consider them more dangerous, and they believe that is more necessary to segregate them and to urge them to follow medical treatment. Labelling someone as mentally ill has negative effects on the decision-making process of police action, moreover, when the type of mental illness is specified, these effects are more negative for schizophrenia than for depression. Conclusions The results of the present study show that, although police officers are aware of the reality concerning mental illness and they assume it positively, they also maintain some attitudes and beliefs that demand special attention, as they could affect police action. Therefore, it is necessary to address the battle against mental illness stigma within the Police. Given the above and the frequency of contact of police officers with these patients, especially when they are victims, we suggest to raise awareness and support campaigns towards victims with mental disease, which might contribute to the improvement of the relationships in both directions, and to reduce the ocultism of these people.