This complete and comprehensive guide to the Mental Health Act 1983 for any mental health professional – from social workers, psychologists and occupational therapists, to doctors and nurses. The book aims to simplify mental health law so that it’s accessible to busy professionals at all stages of practice as well as those affected by mental health law.

Key chapters include details on who operates the Act, who is affected by it, how the law governs issues of capacity and consent to treatment, how to appeal against compulsion, and the role of the nearest relative. There are also important chapters on advocacy, children and human rights issues, as well as an extensive appendices which provide access to the 1983 Act itself, important rules and regulations, and a summary of key cases.

This fourth edition includes:

- Practical advice and checklists for working the Act

- Information on detention of patients in hospital under The Mental Health Act

- The impact of the Policing and Crime Act 2017 on periods of detention and places of safety

- Additional case law detailing patient discharges and Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards.
- The Supreme Court 2019 judgement in the case of D (A Child)