Their website
This is a fantastic example of programs that I feel would be helpful throughout the US. They provide affordable mental health care, counciling and other services to those most in need. They also act as a homeless shelter among other things. Great work.
But now to my segway:
While exploring their site, I came across a term I had never heard of, "Roger's Orders." in this article on forced medication
The only real concrete information I could get right away by googling the subject was at this link
It describes that the term came from a legal case regarding the forced medication of an institutionalized patient. It currently describes a government issued mandate requiring a patient takes his or her medication during outpatient treatment. It was supposed to only be applied to extreme cases, but of late has become more commonly used with little need basis.
There are many people that feel this violates basic human rights, and also demonstrates a gross misunderstanding of drugs in general. Too many people see the drugs as a miricle cure, forgetting that the side-effects can be debilitating and life-altering. When representing patients, or when judging cases, many enter with the idea that "if medicated, the patient would know it was best for him." and therefore the patient isn't treated seriously.
While such laws can be deemed necessary on some level, the practice of these laws leaves something to be desired.
A question that one must ask is, at what point can someone no longer give consent to what happens to their body? At what point is someone too ill to have a say? If someone is living on the streets, does the government have the right to step in and force-medicate on the presumption that they are making the person "less dangerous?" (Especially since, there really isn't an impartial party that can make a good argument as to what constitutes "dangerous enough" to trump the human right of judging what's best for their body?)
I thought it was an interesting tangent.
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