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Responsibility and accountability in community mental health teams

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Steve Onyett*
Affiliation:
Centre for Mental Health Services Development, Kings College London, Campden Hill Road, London W8 7AH
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Abstract

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Community mental health teams are handicapped by long-standing ambiguities about responsibility and accountability. Professional responsibilities need to be separated from practitioner's responsibilities as employees, and clear lines of accountability established accordingly. This requires stronger delegated operational management responsibility at team level. Greater attention should be paid to defining shared, core responsibilities among team practitioners employed by health and social services. These are here defined as ‘care coordinating’ responsibilities and provide a means of reconciling the care programme approach and care management into coherent practice.

Type
Original Papers
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, 1995

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