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This paper highlights some key actions social workers can take to help improve the physical health of people living with mental illness. Despite an 80% comorbidity rate, many people living with mental illness still do not receive a physical health check-up. For this and other reasons, people living with mental illness die, on average, 10–20 years prematurely. This early death is usually preceded by years or decades of poor health. Using a collective impact approach, this paper discusses actions to increase autonomy, advocate for better access to quality physical health care, and minimise iatrogenic harm for people living with mental illness. IMPLICATIONS This paper highlights the key opportunities for social workers to improve the physical health of people living with mental illness. Using a collective impact approach, it highlights the vital role social workers can play in enacting the essential elements of the Equally Well national consensus statement, such as advocating equity of access to physical health care services, supporting quality care, and reducing stigma and discrimination for people living with mental illness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Better Access to Psychiatrists, Psychologists and General Practitioners through the Medicare Benefits Scheme initiative (Better Access), is an Australian Federal Government scheme aiming to improve access to mental health services. Accredited mental health social workers have been involved in the delivery of services under Better Access for more than a decade. In this time, there have been significant changes in the field of mental health services, with consequent increases in size and costs for Better Access. Better Access now represents public spending of more than one billion dollars per annum, yet there is no ongoing account of its impact. In this paper we consider the policy chronology and evaluation of the program, using current available data to question the impact of Better Access on both the service system and the nature of mental health social work practice. This case highlights the importance of a clear articulation of the scope of mental health social work, and ongoing monitoring of the impact of policy in a policy environment increasingly characterised by individualised funding and service delivery structured according to the principles of New Public Management. IMPLICATIONS Social workers' increasing involvement with Better Access has reshaped the scope of mental health social work practice. The impact of Better Access on outcomes for service users and mental health social work is not currently a focus of research attention. Better Access is a case study illustrating the potential of the policy context to directly shape social work practice, therefore critical engagement with the impact of Better Access is an essential professional imperative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The balance between care and control in mental health social work is one of constant tension. In the State of Victoria, Australia, the Mental Health Act 2014 gives coercive powers to social workers employed by public mental health services. These include the power to decide if a person needs to be assessed by a psychiatrist, to "take" a person using bodily restraint, to enter premises, and to search and seize a person's belongings. This paper applies a doctrinal analysis to examine the law, then argues that the use of these powers by social workers, where safe, may be less restrictive than when they are used by police or paramedics. The exercise of these powers may be less traumatic and stigmatising to the people who are subject to them, and social workers may be both legally and ethically obligated to use coercion when appropriate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]