Interdisciplinary teamwork and leadership: issues for psychiatrists.
OBJECTIVE
To review the constructs and applications of interdisciplinary teams in mental health services, with a particular view to ascertaining the most effective types of teams and their leadership.


METHODS
Some of the most challenging questions from a psychiatrist's viewpoint regarding the functions of interdisciplinary teams in the mental health service are addressed.


RESULTS
The effectiveness of the interdisciplinary team in mental health services is supported by an extensive literature that is much more qualitative and descriptive than quantitative and empirically rigorous, except as part of packages of variables subjected to randomized controlled trials.


CONCLUSIONS
Effective interdisciplinary teamwork in mental health services involves both retaining differentiated disciplinary roles and developing shared core tasks. It requires sound leadership, effective team management, clinical supervision and explicit mechanisms for resolving role conflicts and ensuring safe practices. No one profession should hold a monopoly on leadership.
Rosen
Alan
A
Royal North Shore Hospital and Community Mental Health Services, and Department of Psychological Medicine, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia.
Callaly
Tom
T
D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D006801:Humans; D007400:Interprofessional Relations; D007857:Leadership; D008605:Mental Health Services; D011340:Problem Solving; D011361:Professional Competence; D011570:Psychiatry; D000078329:Workforce