Mental health and human rights: challenges for a new millennium

Testing the WHO responsiveness concept in the Iranian mental healthcare system: a qualitative study of service users

“…There is a great need for a broad picture of how the mental health process, as well as the treatment, is perceived by patients [ 38 ]. The delivery of acceptable mental health care to patients is complex and requires strategic planning and flexible resourcing [ 39 ]. On the other hand, it is also important to consider changing the negative and false beliefs about mental and neurological illnesses that still exist among the population.…”

Dr William Saunders Hallaran and psychiatric practice in nineteenth-century Ireland

“…Despite Dr Hallaran's awareness of the adverse effects of the swing, his insistence on ''careful superintendence'' (p. 69) [1] and his belief that he was acting in patients' best interests, it is clear that Dr Cox's circulating swing belonged to an era prior to the development of more humane treatments for the mentally ill and prior to a clear enunciation of the rights of the mentally ill [31]. From today's perspective, Dr Hallaran's enthusiasm for the swing appears misplaced: some 200 years later, it is to be hoped that increased emphasis on the rights of the mentally ill will ensure sustained emphasis on the dignity of patients during treatment and will enhance the provision of evidence-based therapies that are humane, safe, effective and acceptable to patients and their families [32].…”

India’s Mental Healthcare Act, 2017

“…In 2001, the WHO intensified its focus on this area by devoting its annual report to Mental Health: New Understanding, New Hope, and, in its recommendations, placing particular emphasis on legislation and the rights of the mentally ill (WHO 2001a;Kelly 2001). One of the WHO's ten key recommendations for action was that member states should 'establish national policies, programmes and legislation' in relation to mental healthcare, rooted in human rights.…”