Consent and confidentiality in clinical work with young people.
Consent and confidentiality are increasingly important in clinical practice. However, the dilemmas faced by mental health practitioners can be highly complex and difficult to resolve. This difficulty is compounded by the fact that consent and confidentiality are subject to several different types of legislation based on different principles, and many of the policies which are formulated for general medical practice may not fit well with the mental healthcare context. The ethical principles, evidence base, legal context, developmental considerations and clinical context relevant to each situation must all be integrated, in consultation with children and adolescents and their parents, in order to arrive at a treatment plan which is sensitive to the views of all, developmentally appropriate for the children and adolescents, and responsive to changes in the situation or attitudes. We offer some practical approaches, including clinical practice algorithms, to consider the issues of consent and confidentiality in the child and adolescent mental healthcare setting.
Tan
Jacinta O A
JO
Department of Public Health and Primary Care, University of Oxford, UK. jacinta.tan@ethox.ox.ac.uk
Passerini
Giovanni E
GE
Stewart
Anne
A
D000293:Adolescent; D001294:Attitude to Health; D002648:Child; D003219:Confidentiality; D003657:Decision Making; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000628:therapy*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007258:Informed Consent; D008297:Male; D010818:Practice Patterns, Physicians' / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D011586:Psychology, Clinical / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence* / Q000379:methods*; D006113:United Kingdom