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Whose body is it anyway: paternalism and Section 57 of the Mental Health Act 1983

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Femi Oyebode
Femi Oyebode*
Affiliation:
Queen Elizabeth Psychiatric Hospital, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2QZ
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Section 57 of the Mental Health Act 1983 relates to certain forms of medical treatments for mental disorder which require both consent and a second opinion. It applies to any surgical operation for destroying brain tissue or for destroying the functioning of brain tissue; it also applies to the surgical implantation of hormones for the suppression of male sexual drive. These treatments cannot be given unless the patient has consented and three independent people, including a medical practitioner, certify that the patient is capable of understanding the nature of the treatment proposed, has consented to it, and the appointed registered medical practitioner has certified that the treatment is appropriate. This paper examines whether Section 57 is indeed justifiable and whether the current procedure needs amendment.

Type
Forum
Information
Psychiatric Bulletin , Volume 17 , Issue 10 , October 1993 , pp. 616 - 617
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists 1993

References

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Buchanan, A. E. & Brock, D. W. (1989) Deciding For Others: the ethics of surrogate decision making. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Childress, J. F. (1982) Who Should Decide? Oxford Univeristy Press.Google Scholar
Mill, J. S. (1859) On liberty. In Utilitarianism (ed. Warnock, M.). London: Fontana Press.Google Scholar
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