I am an AMHP and wanted a view on a situation I encountered yesterday.
15 year old in general children’s hospital for 2 weeks. Has become more and more withdrawn over past 14 months. Has become mute for past 6 months. S2 applied now due to very obvious signs of psychosis. Did not demonstrate capacity to make decisions about health care. Despite trying a variety of methods to facilitate communication unable to achieve a response or evidence to suggest the young person understood what was said to them. General hospital want to complete blood tests and CT head under general anaesthetic. They intended to do this under mother’s consent. When s2 was applied they thought it would be easier to use General Anaesthetic to conduct these tests. I was uneasy about the team accepting mums consent for such an invasive procedure. I was also uneasy about them using the mental health act. The tests are to eliminate any physical cause for these symptoms. I advised they seek legal advice and whether the trust should consider taking this to court.
I have just seen your post. I think your approach of s seeking legal advice and a ruling from COP, is entirely appropriate.
This matter raises a number of issues that require a considered response rather than a simple placeholder response. I shall consider the matter more fully during my morning run and proffer a more coherent and coherent response later today.
The more I consider this matter the more sure I become that a referral to COP is the best course of action. There seems to be no unequivocal answer that I find satisfactory.
Hi Claire, you are right to think hard about this one. It doesn’t sound appropriate to use Part 4 of the MHA, as the tests don’t seem to be for ‘symptoms or manifestations’ of the mental disorder, but rather to see if there is an organic cause. As the service user is under 16, mother can legally give consent on their behalf, unless there is an obvious conflict of interest. (If they are Gillick competent they could also consent on their own behalf, though the hospital might be reluctant to rely on this in the circumstances.) If the view is that these procedures are so invasive that mum’s consent isn’t apprpriate, I agree the Trust might need to take it to the family court (not Court of Protection as they are under 16)- but it’s really up to the hospital.
Agreed Simon about family court. No idea why I wrote COP. Brain fog is best I can offer