{"id":611110,"date":"2026-04-16T17:00:39","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T17:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/611110\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T17:00:39","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T17:00:39","slug":"legal-grey-areas-putting-mental-health-patients-at-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/611110\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Legal grey areas&#8217; putting mental health patients at risk"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The absence of clear legal powers to prevent people suffering mental health crises from leaving NHS emergency departments has forced lawyers to train healthcare professionals to break the law \u2018in the least harmful way\u2019. That is one conclusion of an investigation by the Health Services Safety Investigations Body (HSSIB), which yesterday warned that a \u2018significant legal gap\u2019 was putting patients in mental health crisis at risk \u2013 and creating an impossible choice for staff trying to keep them safe.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018Most healthcare professionals described use of physical and chemical restraint to try and stop people leaving, despite knowing it is an unlawful deprivation of liberty, because it was considered the \u201cleast worst\u201d scenario,\u2019 the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.hssib.org.uk\/patient-safety-investigations\/safety-issues-for-people-experiencing-a-mental-health-crisis-who-come-into-contact-with-urgent-and-emergency-care-services\/investigation-report-1-of-2\/#executive-summary\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">report<\/a> said.<\/p>\n<p>The investigation was told that the law \u2018exists in a fictional zone where there are never any resource complications and everybody is always able to do their job\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>Law Society vice president Brett Dixon said: \u2018Legal grey areas in mental health care leave patients without proper safeguards unable to access justice. When staff are forced to choose between breaching human rights or letting a vulnerable person walk away from care, the law fails patients and professionals alike.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>The safety investigations body urges the Department of Health and Social Care to review the legal framework, address gaps and clarify legal powers for healthcare professionals to detain people in the emergency department. The Care Quality Commission is told to produce a position statement on existing legal powers.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This article is now closed for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The absence of clear legal powers to prevent people suffering mental health crises from leaving NHS emergency departments&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":611111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[64,63,137,514,515],"class_list":["post-611110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-health","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=611110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/611111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=611110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=611110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=611110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}