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Information for CAMHS patients about tribunals

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Sophia T. Ulhaq ,
Aneira Carter  and
Joan Rutherford
Sophia T. Ulhaq
Affiliation:
The Coborn Centre for Adolescent Mental Health & Ealing CAMHS, Middlesex, UK, email: [email protected]
Joan Rutherford
Affiliation:
First-tier Tribunal (Mental Health), London, UK
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Abstract

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BJPsych Bulletin , Volume 40 , Issue 2 , April 2016 , pp. 106
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Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an open-access article published by the Royal College of Psychiatrists and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 2016

Thomas et al Reference Thomas, Chipchase, Rippon and McArdle1 discussed the legal authority for detention of an 8-year-old child. The patient exercised his right of appeal with assistance from a solicitor and an independent mental health advocate and solicitor. The authors conclude that all clinicians working in child and adolescent services require knowledge of the law in relation to treatment of mental disorders in children.

We consider it equally important that any detained children and adolescents have access to information about the process of a mental health tribunal hearing to ensure they are able to participate fully but also in the least distressing way. All information for patients about the procedure at a tribunal hearing – available via the Royal College of Psychiatrists Reference Rutherford2 or the First-tier Tribunal (Mental Health) website (www.gov.uk/mental-health-tribunal/what-happens-at-the-hearing) – is aimed at adult patients.

To ensure developmentally appropriate information, we worked with a focus group of young people on a child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) in-patient unit and composed a suitable leaflet. The final version has been approved by the First-tier Tribunal (Mental Health) CAMHS panel lead judge and also by the Royal College of Psychiatrists' CAMHS Faculty lead. The leaflet is available on the College website (www.rcpsych.ac.uk/pdf/CAMHS%20GUide%20to%20Mental%20Health%20Tribunals%20Feb%202016.pdf).

We hope that this information will be of benefit to detained young people such as the child in the case report.

References

1 Thomas, V, Chipchase, B, Rippon, L, McArdle, P. The application of mental health legislation in younger children. BJPsych Bull 2015; 39: 302–4.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
2 Rutherford, J. A guide to mental health tribunals (leaflet). Royal College of Psychiatrists, 2015. Available at: http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/healthadvice/problemsdisorders/guidementalhealthtribunals.aspx Google Scholar
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