Involuntary commitment

Involuntary commitment or civil commitment (also known as sectioning in some jurisdictions) is a legal process through which an individual who is deemed by a qualified agent to have symptoms of severe mental disorder is court-ordered into treatment in a psychiatric hospital (inpatient) or in the community (outpatient).

Criteria for civil commitment are established by laws, which vary between nations. Commitment proceedings often follow a period of emergency hospitalization, during which an individual with acute psychiatric symptoms is confined for a relatively short duration (e.g. 72 hours) in a treatment facility for evaluation and stabilization by mental health professionals—who may then determine whether further civil commitment is appropriate or necessary. If civil commitment proceedings follow, then the evaluation is presented in a formal court hearing where testimony and other evidence may also be submitted. The subject of the hearing is typically entitled to legal counsel and may challenge a commitment order through habeas corpus rules.

Historically, until the first third of the twentieth century or later in most jurisdictions, all committals to public psychiatric facilities and most committals to private ones were involuntary. Since then, there have been alternating trends towards the abolition or substantial reduction of involuntary commitment, a trend known as "deinstitutionalisation."

In most jurisdictions, involuntary commitment is specifically applied to individuals believed to be experiencing a mental illness that impairs their reasoning ability to such an extent that the agents of the law, state, or courts determine that decisions will be made for the individual, under a legal framework. In some jurisdictions, this is a distinct proceeding from being "found incompetent."

Involuntary commitment is used to some degree for each of the following headings although different jurisdictions have different criteria. Some jurisdictions limit court-ordered treatment to individuals who meet statutory criteria for presenting a danger "to self or others." Other jurisdictions have broader criteria.

Training is gradually becoming available in mental health first aid to equip community members such as teachers, school administrators, police officers, and medical workers with training in recognizing, and authority in managing, situations where involuntary evaluations of behavior are applicable under law. The extension of first aid training to cover mental health problems and crises is a quite recent development. A mental health first aid training course was developed in Australia in 2001 and has been found to improve assistance provided to persons with an alleged mental illness or mental health crisis. This form of training has now spread to a number of other countries (Canada, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, Singapore, Scotland, England, Wales, and the United States).Mental health triage may be used in an emergency room to make a determination about potential risk and apply treatment protocols.

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