Article Text
Abstract
Objective Physical healthcare has dominated the patient safety field; research in mental healthcare is not as extensive but findings from physical healthcare cannot be applied to mental healthcare because it delivers specialised care that faces unique challenges. Therefore, a clearer focus and recognition of patient safety in mental health as a distinct research area is still needed. The study aim is to identify future research priorities in the field of patient safety in mental health.
Design Semistructured interviews were conducted with the experts to ascertain their views on research priorities in patient safety in mental health. A three-round online Delphi study was used to ascertain consensus on 117 research priority statements.
Setting and participants Academic and service user experts from the USA, UK, Switzerland, Netherlands, Ireland, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore were included.
Main outcome measures Agreement in research priorities on a five-point scale.
Results Seventy-nine statements achieved consensus (>70%). Three out of the top six research priorities were patient driven; experts agreed that understanding the patient perspective on safety planning, on self-harm and on medication was important.
Conclusions This is the first international Delphi study to identify research priorities in safety in the mental field as determined by expert academic and service user perspectives. A reasonable consensus was obtained from international perspectives on future research priorities in patient safety in mental health; however, the patient perspective on their mental healthcare is a priority. The research agenda for patient safety in mental health identified here should be informed by patient safety science more broadly and used to further establish this area as a priority in its own right. The safety of mental health patients must have parity with that of physical health patients to achieve this.
- patient safety
- delphi study
- research priorities
- mental health
- service users
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Footnotes
Contributors LHD drafted and finalised the protocol, designed the study, led the data collection and analysis and interpreted the data. LHD drafted the manuscript and is also the corresponding author. KM advised on clinical definitions, mental health content interpretation and intellectual content. KM, BT, SCR and S Archer were involved in drafting the manuscript and approved the final version to be published. BT contributed to data collection. S Adam advised on clinical definitions, critically reviewed intellectual content and was involved in the drafting and critical appraisal of the manuscript. She also approved the final manuscript. AD approved the final manuscript to be published. S Archer contributed to designing the protocol, advised on service user recruitment and critically reviewed intellectual content. She was also involved in critical appraisal of the manuscript and approved the final version.
Funding This work was supported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Patient Safety Translational Research Centre via an NIHR programme grant.
Competing interests None declared.
Patient consent Not required.
Ethics approval The study was approved by the Imperial College Research Ethics Committee.
Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.
Data sharing statement No additional data are available.