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213. Analysis of the impact of health law on the mental health of individuals with mental illness

Year: 2026
Type: conference-abstract
Abstract: Background The global population of patients with mental illness continues to expand. Their mental health is not only affected by the disease itself, but also aggravates negative emotions due to the lack of medical rights, privacy leaks, discrimination and other issues that damage their rights and interests. Existing research mostly focuses on drug and psychological intervention. Research on the application of health law in the field of mental health is relatively scattered, and its specific impact and action path on mental health have not yet been clarified. In order to fill this gap, the study will construct a health law intervention system to explore its actual impact on patients' mental health and help improve patients' mental health. Methods Stratified sampling was conducted to select 180 patients from 2 tertiary mental health institutions and 1 community health service center who met the relevant diagnostic criteria, had a disease duration of ≥1 year, and were aged 18-60 years old. Patients with cognitive impairment and severe organic diseases were excluded. Among them, 98 were male and 82 were female; 65 had depression, 58 had schizophrenia, and 57 had bipolar disorder. Implement a three-month health law intervention, covering the core rights and interests provisions of the Mental Health Law of the People's Republic of China; provide one-on-one consultation and rights protection on the online platform, and provide free legal assistance. The study used the Self-Rating Symptom Scale and the Depression Anxiety Stress Scale to collect and analyze data before, 1 month and 3 months after the intervention. Results The results show that the degree of awareness of health law is positively correlated with patients' mental health status (r = 0.45, p<.01), and the degree of legal implementation is positively correlated with patients' mental health status (r = 0.50, p<.01). In addition, the degree of legal implementation is the main factor affecting patients' mental health (β = 0.40, p<.01), followed by the degree of public awareness (β = 0.25, p<.05). The patient return rate increased from 75.3% to 91.2%, and the incidence of rights damage incidents dropped from 22.6% to 5.1%. The results show that inadequate implementation of laws and insufficient public awareness are the main negative factors affecting patients' mental health, and health law intervention can effectively improve the mental health of patients with mental illness. Discussion Research has clarified the positive impact of health law on mental health, providing patients with another way to improve mental health in addition to drug treatment and psychological intervention. Patients can improve their mental health by learning health law knowledge and proactively safeguarding their own rights and interests. At the same time, the research provides an innovative direction for mental health services to integrate medical treatment with law, proving that the implementation of health law can directly benefit patients' mental health. Future research can expand the sample coverage, extend the follow-up period, explore personalized intervention plans for patients with different types of mental illness, further deepen the integration mechanism of health law and mental health services, and promote the formation of a more complete patient rights protection and mental health promotion system.
DOI: 10.1093/schbul/sbag003.211
Author: Baochao Xie
Language: English
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7128768327
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