Clinical supervision in forensic psychiatry in India.

Abstract

The present paper draws from the authors' experiences while working on an interdisciplinary research project that examined the mental health of prisoners sentenced to death in India. In this paper, the authors share a few narratives to illustrate the positive and negative impacts of clinical supervision that they received during their association with this project. Specifically, the authors discuss the impact of a range of resources such as supervisors' theoretical orientation, prior work experience, use of culturally sensitive tools on the skill development, and the mental health of trainees, especially in an Indian organizational context. This paper also highlights the role of clinical supervisors in guiding mental health trainees through various ethical dilemmas, with particular emphasis on the research related to incarcerated populations. Lastly, the authors draw attention to the problems of conducting multidisciplinary clinical research in developing nations such as India and discuss the means to overcome them. The paper concludes with implications for clinical supervisors in the field of forensic mental health who want to undertake research and clinical work on a similar topic in the future.

Introduction to the special issue: Supervisee perspectives of supervision processes.

“…While a fairly intuitive finding, the importance of a strong foundation should not be dismissed. As illustrated by the narratives in this special issue, a strong supervisory alliance can foster confidence (Mammen, 2020), facilitate important disclosures that impact quality care (Guttman, 2020), reduce problematic feelings of burnout (Aggarwal & Bhatia, 2020), and promote exploration of countertransference as impacting supervisee interactions with clients (Cucco, 2020). Despite these benefits, there is strong evidence that supervisors may not be sufficiently attending to development of strong positive relationships with supervisees.…”

“…Bedford, Repa, and Renouf (2020) further describe improved communication with clients as a function of supervisory feedback. Strong supervisory alliances are credited across the special issue with increasing supervisee willingness to explore countertransference (Cucco, 2020), improving self-efficacy among supervisees (Mammen, 2020), and reducing feelings of burnout (Aggarwal & Bhatia, 2020).…”