Forty-Five Years of Civil Litigation Against Canadian Psychiatrists: An Empirical Pilot Study.

ABSTRACT:

Objectives

To extract the themes pertaining to prudent psychiatric practice from written court judgments in Canada.

Methods

We searched the medical and legal literature for cases involving civil litigation against Canadian psychiatrist and reviewed all available written judgments. We completed a thematic analysis of the civil actions against psychiatrists as conveyed by those written court judgments. We classified the cases according to the disposal status and the essential lessons from the decisions on standard of care and practice by Canadian psychiatrists.

Results

Forty such cases were identified as involving psychiatrists over a 45-year period. A subgroup included those dealing with limitation periods and disclosure applications. Thirty of the 40 cases (75%) were

SUBMITTER: Mela M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4784241 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature