Health care and consumerism - a poor combination
I have never been entirely comfortable with the term consumer when referred to individuals receiving mental health services - or really any health related services. The term is new, with the earliest OED citation being 1968. Initially it had the implication of a demand for high quality goods and services. Today, however, it has morphed into implying an insatiable demand for goods and services - generally at lower and lower prices.
This newer meaning always seemed inappropriate to me when it comes to health services but I could never quite put my finger on exactly why it was troubling. Yesterday, as I was riding my bike along the Gulf of Mexico, I heard a 2004 TED lecture by James Howard Kunstler, The Tragedy of Suburbia. He nailed it for me. The term, he opined, was problematic because it means that consumers "do not have obligations responsibilities and duties to their fellow human beings" (you can find this quote at the very end of the lecture).
For health services including those for physical health, mental health, and substance abuse we should never consider ourselves passive recipients. Rather we should be responsible for our own behaviors, should participate actively in our care, should consider it our duty to help others in similar circumstances, and should widely promote the benefits we have received. In other words, we should not be consumers but active participants and change agents.