Experiences of acute care by persons with mental health problems: An integrative literature review
Authors: Schmidt Manuela , Uman Timur 
Published: February 2020

Accessible summary

What is known on the subject?

Understanding experiences of acute care by persons with mental health problems is vital for improving these experiences through the development of different parts of the care delivery and its facilities. Literature has extensively addressed experiences of persons with mental health problems in acute care settings. Yet, there is a paucity of studies that aggregate and organize these findings in presenting development‐oriented solutions for the improvements of these experiences.

What the paper adds to existing knowledge?

Acute care can be understood through patients’ experiences of structure (such as setting, staff and resources); process (such as communication and interpersonal relations); and outcome (such as satisfaction and post‐discharge well‐being and health) and suggests improvements in these domains.

The paper illuminates that previous literature has mainly captured negative experiences of acute care by persons with mental health problems, and suggests diverting the focus to the best practices and to seek inspiration from other fields of research.

What are the implications for practice?

Attending to the improvement and development of different parts of the acute care might be an important step in improving experiences of persons with mental health problems. For example, improving resource allocation systems and facilities, emphasizing professionalism in encounters with these patients and systematically assessing patient satisfaction during and after visits are important areas that require attention.

Aim

The provision of acute care to persons with mental health problems is challenging due to difficulties in encountering this group and the vulnerability of these persons. Understanding this group's experiences with acute care is thus an important endeavour. The purpose of this review was to critically and systematically identify and assess previous research on experiences of acute care by persons with mental health problems, guided by Donabedian's structure–process–outcome framework (Prospero ID: CRD42019116652).

Method and results

An integrative literature review was performed, resulting in the identification of 43 studies. The search was conducted using five electronic databases: Web of Science Core, PubMed, MEDLINE, CINAHL and PsycINFO.

Discussion

The review revealed that patients experienced structure components such as setting, staff and resources in a predominantly negative way. A predominately negative picture also emerged of the process components, where, for example, communication and interpersonal relations were represented by negative experiences, with limited positive experiences reported. The outcome components, related to patients’ satisfaction and their well‐being after discharge, were also predominantly experienced negatively.

Implications for practice

Using Donabedian's framework of structure, process and outcome allowed us to systematize the literature reviewed, to identify the research gaps and to suggest ways forward for the field's development.