Article Text
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has introduced new ethical challenges in the care of patients with serious psychiatric illness who require inpatient treatment and who may have beeen exposed to COVID-19 or have mild to moderate COVID-19 but refuse testing and adherence to infection prevention protocols. Such situations increase the risk of infection to other patients and staff on psychiatric inpatient units. We discuss medical and ethical considerations for navigating this dilemma and offer a set of policy recommendations.
- psychiatry
- clinical ethics
- involuntary civil commitment
- right to refuse treatment
This article is made freely available for use in accordance with BMJ’s website terms and conditions for the duration of the covid-19 pandemic or until otherwise determined by BMJ. You may use, download and print the article for any lawful, non-commercial purpose (including text and data mining) provided that all copyright notices and trade marks are retained.
https://bmj.com/coronavirus/usageStatistics from Altmetric.com
Read the full text or download the PDF:
Other content recommended for you
- Establishing a COVID-19 treatment centre in Israel at the initial stage of the outbreak: challenges, responses and lessons learned
- New Zealand Emergency Department COVID-19 Preparedness: a cross-sectional survey and narrative view
- ‘Like building a plane and flying it all in one go’: an interview study of infection prevention and control in Australian general practice during the first 2 years of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic
- Evaluation of dedicated COVID-19 hospitals in the pandemic response in Iraq: pandemic preparation within a recovering healthcare infrastructure
- Safely restarting GI endoscopy in the era of COVID-19
- ‘Fighting a Global War Using a Local Strategy’: contextualism in COVID-19 response in Africa
- EULAR recommendations for the management and vaccination of people with rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases in the context of SARS-CoV-2: the November 2021 update
- Importance of inclusive leadership in the pandemic response: the critical role of the physician
- ‘We are not going to shut down, because we cannot postpone pregnancy’: a mixed-methods study of the provision of maternal healthcare in six referral maternity wards in four sub-Saharan African countries during the COVID-19 pandemic
- Examining the discourse regarding the delivery of occupational infection prevention and control training to healthcare workers: a scoping review of pandemic plans of 23 countries