Abstract
Background
General Practitioners are often faced with deciding whether or not an unwell patient requires detention for assessment in hospital under mental health legislation. This can be a complex and daunting process. Despite this, General Practitioners and most other professionals involved receive limited formal training.
Aim
To map and review the current literature on training in mental health detention processes. These insights are vital to inform the further development of meaningful educational approaches.
Design & Setting
A systematic scoping literature review was conducted to identify what is known about how best to develop training in this area.
Method
Arskey and O’Malley’s framework was used to select, chart and analyse articles from across six electronic databases. 1,136 articles were included in the initial screening phase and 183 articles were included in the full-text screening phase. Key themes were derived using an iterative and thematic approach. A personal and public involvement group was set up for this project and other stakeholders in the mental health detention process were consulted about our findings.
Results
52 articles were included in the final review. Professionals consistently highlighted unmet training needs and difficulties with the process. There were identified needs for practical, interdisciplinary training including discussion of complex cases, and opportunities to learn from those with direct experience.
Conclusion
This work is foundational for the development of meaningful educational approaches around mental health detention processes. A strong research base will inform and strengthen training with the ultimate aim of improving patient care.
General Practitioners are often faced with deciding whether or not an unwell patient requires detention for assessment in hospital under mental health legislation. This can be a complex and daunting process. Despite this, General Practitioners and most other professionals involved receive limited formal training.
Aim
To map and review the current literature on training in mental health detention processes. These insights are vital to inform the further development of meaningful educational approaches.
Design & Setting
A systematic scoping literature review was conducted to identify what is known about how best to develop training in this area.
Method
Arskey and O’Malley’s framework was used to select, chart and analyse articles from across six electronic databases. 1,136 articles were included in the initial screening phase and 183 articles were included in the full-text screening phase. Key themes were derived using an iterative and thematic approach. A personal and public involvement group was set up for this project and other stakeholders in the mental health detention process were consulted about our findings.
Results
52 articles were included in the final review. Professionals consistently highlighted unmet training needs and difficulties with the process. There were identified needs for practical, interdisciplinary training including discussion of complex cases, and opportunities to learn from those with direct experience.
Conclusion
This work is foundational for the development of meaningful educational approaches around mental health detention processes. A strong research base will inform and strengthen training with the ultimate aim of improving patient care.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | BJGPO.2022.0061 |
| Number of pages | 9 |
| Journal | BJGP Open |
| Volume | 6 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Early online date | 19 Oct 2022 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 20 Dec 2022 |
Keywords
- mental health detention
- general practice
- training
Access to Document
- The mental health detention process: a scoping review to inform GP training
Copyright 2022 The Authors. This is an open access article published under a Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the author and source are cited.