Seclusion room vs. physical restraint in an adolescent inpatient setting: patients' attitudes.

Background: The use of physical restraints or a seclusion room for the treatment of adolescents in a psychiatric inpatient setting raises ethical dilemmas. We investigated the attitudes of adolescents towards these two means of confinement.

Method: We used a structured questionnaire to collect data on the attitudes of 50 adolescent patients, hospitalized in a closed psychiatric ward, towards the use of physical restraint versus a seclusion room.

Level of training of nursing staff and the autonomy given to psychiatric inpatients: a multicenter study.

This research examines the influence of the level of professional training of the caretaking staff in psychiatric wards, the type of wards in which a patient is treated and the patient's age compared with the level of limitation put on patient autonomy. Detailed questionnaires were administered to 296 nurses from five mental health centers who met inclusion criteria for the study. The level of autonomy restriction was measured using six representative cases from fieldwork of the interviewees.