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MENTAL HEALTH (CARE AND TREATMENT) (SCOTLAND) ACT 2003 TRANSITIONAL TRAINING GUIDE INTRODUCTORY TRAINING FOR MENTAL HEALTH OFFICERS AND OTHER PRACTITIONERS
ANNEX B
Answers to the First Self-Assessed Test of Knowledge (Reader 1)
1.
Q: Do you know which groups of people are bound by the principles in part 1 of the Act?
A: In the First Reader we referred to a group of professionals such as medical practitioners, MHOs, nursing staff, hospital administrators and bodies like the Commission and the Tribunal, which we called formal agents because of their relation to formal functions under the Act. While this was not a precise and all inclusive list, if you have approximated it in your answer, you have done well. If you were able to contrast it with the list of people from section 1 (7) who are definitely not bound by the principles (the patient, the named person, the primary carer etc) then you have done doubly well.
2.
Q: What groups of people are protected by the principles?
A: If you answered that the principles protect 'the patient', the subject of any compulsion, then you have half of the answer (arguably the most important half). However, the principles also offer added rights (and therefore protection) to carers. Most importantly, you ought to have picked up on the fact that the principles offer augmented protection to any patient who is also a child, under the age of 18.
3.
Q: What is 'the named person'?
A: It is a person nominated by the patient with certain provisos (such as the patient's capacity to nominate, the countersignature of a prescribed person and the agreement of the nominated person). The named person has a function that supports the patient and protects his or her interests. The named person has rights (for example, to receive information about the patient's detention). It is a role that largely replaces the function of the nearest relative in the 1984 Act.
If you added to this that, unlike the 1984 Act's nearest relative, the named person has no role in giving consent or making applications, give yourself 101%!
4.
Q: How many people sit on a Tribunal and from what panels are they drawn?
A: A panel has 3 members, drawn from each of the three panels convened by the Tribunal: The medical panel, the legal panel and the third panel of other interested people.
5.
Q: Is it the case that a Short-Term Detention must follow on from an Emergency Detention?
A: No.
6.
Q: How long can a Short-Term Detention last?
A: Up to 28 days, non-renewable, but extendable by an Extension Certificate, much like the old section 26A. (If you got half of this you are still doing well.)
7.
Q: How is a Compulsory Treatment Order granted?
A: By a Tribunal, following application by an MHO, resting on two medical recommendations.
8.
Q: How long does it last for?
A: Up to 6 months in the first instance, renewable for 6 months and thereafter annually.
9.
Q: What is an advanced statement?
A: It is a statement drawn up by the patient while the patient has capacity to commit wishes regarding how he or she wants to be treated and does not want to be treated. If properly drawn up, with a witness statement confirming capacity at the time of making, the wishes contained in it have standing beyond the patient's loss of capacity. Regard must be had for the statement by a medical practitioner giving treatment and by a Tribunal making decisions about the patient.
10.
Q: Under section 259, who has a right to advocacy and upon whom is the duty placed to ensure access to it?
A: The right to advocacy is extended to any person with a mental disorder living in a given area. The duty to ensure access to advocacy services is placed upon the Local Authority and Health Board of that area, working in collaboration. In practice this duty to ensure access probably devolves down to practitioner level.
This pack is one of a series of Training Guides detailed below developed for local authority mental health officers and related health and social care staff commissioned from Robert Gordon University by the Scottish Executive.
Reader 1
Introductory training for mental health officers and other practitioners
Reader 2
Emergency and short-term detention and related matters
Reader 3
Compulsory treatment orders and related matters
Reader 4
Provision of social circumstance reports and provisions for people with mental disorder within the criminal justice system and other related matters
Trainers Guide for Readers 1-4
Briefing Paper
For health service and local authority managers
Briefing Paper
For local authority elected members
This material is also available on the Scottish Executive's mental health law website
www.scotland.gov.uk/health/mentalhealthlaw
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