mentally infirm

Question

0"Those with special needs such as the mentally infirm are provided medical care and placed in separate housing where appropriate for their individual case," he said.02br02br00Is mentally infirm equal to mentally challenged?02br02br00Thanks in advance!0-

Optilang · Accepted Answer

0 mentally infirm for me means mentally ill02br
00I'm not sure that someone who is mentally ill is mentally challenged - I could be mentally challenged by a problem that I have to solve.02br
00Let's see what the natives say 0-

Marius Hancu · Answer

0 "Mentally challenged" means both, I'd avoid it if the context isn't very clear, but presently is being mainly used as an euphemism for:02br
05002br
00by Jeffrey Ian Ross, Stephen C. Richards - 05100 - 2002 - 219 pages02br
00Unless you are "physically or 01b00mentally challenged02b00" 01b00(mentally ill, mentally 02br
02b02br
02br
01b00 retarded02b00), washing dishes 12 hours a day, 7 days a week can hardly be called 01b00...02b02br
02br
00---------02br
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00 0240hrefhttp://books.google.com/books?id=kB2MxictBjUC&q=%22mentally+challenged%22&dq=%22mentally+challenged%22&lr=cBehind Bars: Surviving Prison - 241cSocial Science

Nona the brit · Answer

0'infirm' is a word I only really associate with older people so I'd assume that they were older people with, maybe, Alzheimers or something. 0-

Optilang · Answer

0 01blockquote

01cite10nona the brit12cite10'infirm' is a word I only really associate with older people so I'd assume that they were older people with, maybe, Alzheimers or something. 12br
12blockquote

10So when we have the phrase - for example - this place is for the old and infirm02br
00does it mean it is for old people who are ill02br
00or it is for both old people and others (who may not be old) but are ill?02br
00Thanks 0-

New2grammar · Answer

0On the contrary, they were juveniles who had been detained in detention centres operated by the US army in Iraq for more than a year on average without trial.02br
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00I'll try to search for the article and provide the link.02br
02br
00Here'sthe link02br
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01a05000/ 02a0230hrefhttp://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/05/21/iraq.main

Marius Hancu · Answer

0 01blockquote

01cite10nona the brit12cite10'infirm' is a word I only really associate with older people so I'd assume that they were older people with, maybe, Alzheimers or something. 12br
12blockquote

10I don't quite agree. It can relate to any age, IMO. 0-

Ben Baber · Answer

I work in Dementia and Mental Health care.

By my understanding - which is by no means unequivocal - mentally infirm is generally regarded as meaning someone who has limited mental capacity due to an illness or condition, resulting in the need for care to be provided.

This includes things such as dementia which has many and varied causes and can affect young and old, but it also covers victims of abuse, recovering drug/alcohol addicts, anorexics etc.
It is generally accepted that infirm means fragile or frail, as opposed to absent, and therefore implies in most cases that full mental capacity was present at some point.

Mentally challenged is pretty much a politically correct way of saying mentally retarded, which tends to imply that full mental capacity was never present eg. Down's Syndrome, Autism etc.

A common reference to mentally infirm is the use of the somewhat archaic term EMI (Elderly, mentally infirm) which again implies that full capacity existed at some point and also that the reduction of mental capacity has occurred as a result of advanced age. Unfortunately, many people including newly-trained carers and nurses are still using the term EMI, which in my opinion is a major cause of poorly orientated care for the elderly due to the tendency to group every type of reduced mental capacity into one category and therefore one method of care/treatment instead of focusing on individual and personalised care.

Hope this helps.

mentally infirm

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