Description
Book SynopsisThis book provides mental capacity practitioners with accessible ethical guidance and applicable tools for applying the Mental Capacity Act (MCA) 2005. It shows how clients' relationships can impact their capacity in positive and negative ways, and which communication skills practitioners can use to enable and empower those with impairment. It also covers how to engage in self-reflection and transparent debate about values to improve the quality of assessments.
Helping practitioners interpret complex issues of mental capacity in the most beneficial way for clients, this book is essential reading for students and practitioners of law, medicine, mental health services and social care.
Trade ReviewThis book grapples with the boundaries of capacity law, and the ways in which narratives themselves can empower and disempower. It is an accessibly written guide to the challenging ethical and legal questions facing social care practitioners today. -- Dr Lucy Series, Wellcome Research Fellow and Lecturer in Law, Cardiff School of Law and Politics, Cardiff University, UK
This is an extremely practical book replete with case examples and checklists of reflective questions. It is both accessible
and intensely thought-provoking. The authors are two expert guides who take us on a fascinating journey through the intricacies of mental capacity law. -- Professor Penny Cooper, BSc (Hons), Barrister, PhD, Chair of The Advocate's Gateway, Council of the Inns of Court
A valuable and welcome book that focuses on the relational aspects of the Mental Capacity Act 2005; considering the individuals at the heart of best interests decision making to the practitioner, this book encourages us to all reflect on what makes us as individual human beings, what shapes us and apply that in how we engage with others.
Ensuring decision makers see the person first, this book focuses on how practitioners can do just that, intertwining with existing case law, capacity assessments and ultimately best interests decision making. A valuable resource for all that work in this area.
-- Jakki Cowley, Advocate & Director of Empowerment Matters, an Advocacy & Mental Capacity Act, Resource, Support & Information Agency
Table of Contents1. The legal landscape and the challenge for practitioners. 2. What is autonomy? 3. Why relationships matter. 4. Enabling and disabling narratives. 5. The ethical role of the capacity and best interests assessor. 6. Capacity and best interests: a not-so-bright line. 7. Conclusion. 8. Bibliography. 9. Appendices: theoretical resources. 10. Appendix: practical resource. 11. Statutes and cases.
