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. 2024 Jan 5;10(1):e23.
doi: 10.1192/bjo.2023.622.

Bringing together the World Health Organization's QualityRights initiative and the World Psychiatric Association's programme on implementing alternatives to coercion in mental healthcare: a common goal for action

Neeraj Gill  1 , Natalie Drew  2 , Maria Rodrigues  3 , Hassan Muhsen  4 , Guadalupe Morales Cano  5 , Martha Savage  6 , Soumitra Pathare  7 , John Allan  8 , Silvana Galderisi  9 , Afzal Javed  10 , Helen Herrman  11 , Michelle Funk  2
Affiliations

Bringing together the World Health Organization's QualityRights initiative and the World Psychiatric Association's programme on implementing alternatives to coercion in mental healthcare: a common goal for action

Neeraj Gill et al. BJPsych Open. .

Abstract

Background: Stakeholders worldwide increasingly acknowledge the need to address coercive practices in mental healthcare. Options have been described and evaluated in several countries, as noted recently in major policy documents from the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Psychiatric Association (WPA). The WHO's QualityRights initiative promotes human rights and quality of care for persons with mental health conditions and psychosocial disabilities. A position statement from the WPA calls for implementation of alternatives to coercion in mental healthcare.

Aims: We describe the engagement of both the WHO and WPA in this work. We discuss their mutual aim to support countries in improving human rights and quality of care, as well as the differences between these two organisations in their stated goals related to coercion in mental healthcare: the WHO's approach to eliminate coercion and the WPA's goal to implement alternatives to coercion.

Method: We outline and critically analyse the common ground between the two organisations, which endorse a similar range of rights-based approaches to promoting non-coercive practices in service provision, including early intervention in prevention and care and other policy and practice changes.

Results: Advocacy and action based on an agreed need to find practical solutions and advances in this area have the power to build consensus and unify key actors.

Conclusions: We conclude that persons with lived experience, families, mental health professionals and policy makers are now coming together in several parts of the world to work toward the common goals of improving quality, promoting human rights and addressing coercion in mental health services.

Keywords: Coercion; human rights; involuntary treatment; mental health conditions; mental healthcare.

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Conflict of interest statement

M.F. and N.D. oversee the WHO QualityRights initiative. S.G., J.A. and H.H. are co-chairs, and N.G., G.M., S.P., M.R., M.S., M.F. and N.D. are members/observers of the WPA Alternatives to Coercion Working Group 2020–2023. H.H. is former President of WPA and A.J. is the current President of WPA. S.G. and H.H. are members of the BJPsych Open Editorial Board; however, they did not take part in the review or decision-making process of this paper. The authors alone are responsible for the views expressed in this article, and they do not necessarily represent the views, decisions or policies of the institutions with which they are affiliated.

References

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    1. World Health Organization (WHO). WHO QualityRights Tool Kit. WHO, 2012. (https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789241548410).