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. 2018 Apr 1;69(4):472-475.
doi: 10.1176/appi.ps.201700321. Epub 2018 Feb 1.

Mental Health Providers' Attitudes About Criminal Justice-Involved Clients With Serious Mental Illness

Sachini N Bandara  1 , Gail L Daumit  1 , Alene Kennedy-Hendricks  1 , Sarah Linden  1 , Seema Choksy  1 , Emma E McGinty  1
Affiliations

Mental Health Providers' Attitudes About Criminal Justice-Involved Clients With Serious Mental Illness

Sachini N Bandara et al. Psychiatr Serv. .

Abstract

Objective: Community mental health providers' attitudes toward criminal justice-involved clients with serious mental illness were examined.

Methods: A total of 627 Maryland psychiatric rehabilitation program providers responded to a survey (83% response rate). Measures assessed providers' experience with, positive regard for, and perceptions of similarity, with their clients with serious mental illness. Chi-square tests were used to compare providers' attitudes toward clients with and without criminal justice involvement.

Results: Providers reported lower regard for criminal justice-involved clients than for clients without such involvement. Providers were less likely to report having a great deal of respect for clients with (79%) versus without (95%) criminal justice involvement. On all items that measured providers' perceived similarity with their clients, less than 50% of providers rated themselves as similar, regardless of clients' criminal justice status.

Conclusions: Future research should explore how providers' attitudes toward criminal justice-involved clients influence service delivery for this group.

Keywords: Attitudes toward mental illness; Quality of care.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors report no financial relationships with commercial interests.

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