How patient participation is constructed in mental health care: a grounded theory study.

AIM: The aim of the study was to explore how patient participation is constructed in social interaction processes between nurses, other health professionals and service users, and which structures provide a framework for the participation of service users in a psychiatric context? METHODOLOGICAL DESIGN: Ten tape-recorded interviews of nurses and observations of interactions between nurses, other health professionals and service users reflected differing constructed views of patient participation. Charmaz's interpretation of the grounded theory method was used, and the data were analysed using constant comparative analysis. ETHICAL ISSUES AND APPROVAL: The study was designed in accordance with the ethical principles of the Helsinki Declaration (1) and Danish law (2). Each study participant in the two psychiatric departments gave informed consent after verbal and written information. FINDINGS: The articulation of patient participation emphasises the challenge between, on the one side, orientations of ethical care, and, on the other, paternalism and biomedicine. The core category was generated from four inter-related categories: (i) taking care of the individual needs; (ii) the service user as expert; and (iii) biomedicine, and (iv) paternalism, and their 13 subcategories. CONCLUSIONS: This study illuminates the meaning of patient participation in a psychiatric context based on social interaction between nurses, other health professionals and service users. This can contribute to dealing with the challenges of incorporating patient participation as an ideology in all service users in a psychiatric context and is therefore important knowledge for health professionals.

Patient participation in mental health care - perspectives of healthcare professionals: an integrative review.

BACKGROUND: In contemporary Western liberal society, patient participation has become a key goal in psychiatric healthcare treatment. Health professionals must encourage patients to play an active and involved part in their treatment. According to Danish health law, patients have the right to participate in their treatment, and the mental health system therefore needs to be reformed in order to ensure that treatment is based on individual, liberal, values. However, patient participation is not clearly defined, and it is therefore a challenge to transfer it to clinical practice. AIMS: This integrative review's aims are to explore how professionals perceive the challenges regarding patient participation in the treatment course in mental health care. DESIGN: An integrative review. FINDINGS: Seven studies met the inclusion criteria: six employed qualitative methodologies and one utilised a mixed-methods approach. The empirical studies took place in Norway, the UK and Australia, all in a mental health setting. Three themes were identified: 'Patient participation as collaboration between the healthcare professional and patient', 'Challenges to participation' and 'From a professional's perspective - what expectations do patients have when participating in decision-making?' CONCLUSION: Different synonymous terms describing the patient's active role during treatment - user participation, collaboration, partnership, user involvement and patient participation - are linked to a recovery-oriented approach, shared decision-making, shared ownership and care plans. This integrative review achieves specific knowledge around patient participation, comparing the situation for adult patients with various mental disorders. However, upon reflecting on the included studies, patient participation is not clearly defined, and it is therefore difficult to transfer it to clinical practice.

Basic ethical principles in European bioethics and biolaw: autonomy, dignity, integrity and vulnerability--towards a foundation of bioethics and biolaw.

This article summarizes some of the results of the BIOMED II project "Basic Ethical Principles in European Bioethics and Biolaw" (1995-1998) connected to a research project of the Danish Research Councils "Bioethics and Law" (1993-1998). The BIOMED project was based on cooperation between 22 partners in most EU countries. The aim of the project was to identify the ethical principles of respect for autonomy, dignity, integrity and vulnerability as four important ideas or values for a European bioethics and biolaw. The research concluded that the basic ethical principles cannot be understood as universal everlasting ideas or transcendental truths but they rather function reflective guidelines and important values in European culture. The method of the research was conceptual, philosophical analysis of the cultural background of the four values or normative ideas that people use and find important in their existence. Moreover, this was combined with analysis of empirical legal material and policy documents. Also, a number of qualitative interviews with relevant experts were carried out. Another important result of the BIOMED project was the partner's Policy Proposals to the European Commission, the Barcelona Declaration, unique as a philosophical and political agreement between experts in bioethics and biolaw from many different countries. The Policy Proposals are reprinted here at the end of the article.