title: The experience of adolescent inpatient care and the anticipated transition to the community: Young people's perspectives.
abstract: This study explored adolescents' perspectives of inpatient mental health care, focussing on aspects of the inpatient environment they anticipated would help or hinder their transition back home. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 adolescent inpatients; transcripts were analysed thematically. Participants experienced inpatient treatment as offering a mix of benefits (e.g., supportive relationships) and drawbacks (e.g., living in a "fake world"). They anticipated the transition home as providing opportunities for personal growth and consolidation of new coping skills, but also posing challenges concerning re-entering the "real world" after the experience of being "wrapped in cotton wool". Self-determination theory and attachment theory offer two potential frameworks for understanding these opportunities and challenges. Inpatient care has the potential to foster key mechanisms for adaptive development, creating a platform for developing positive future behaviours. Community teams should work closely with inpatient units to support the generalisation of the young person's newly acquired coping skills.
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK. Electronic address: freya.gill.11@ucl.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Freya
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Gill
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK. Electronic address: stephen.butler@ucl.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Stephen
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Butler
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical, Educational and Health Psychology, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT, UK. Electronic address: n.pistrang@ucl.ac.uk.
authors.forename: Nancy
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Pistrang
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001294:Attitude to Health; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007297:Inpatients / Q000523:psychology*; D008131:London; D008297:Male; D008605:Mental Health Services; D036301:Qualitative Research; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D000069341:Transitional Care
keywords: Adolescent; Inpatient treatment; Mental health; Psychiatric; Qualitative