Ethical Issues of Occupational Therapist in the Field of Mental Health

Occupational therapists working at mental health areas face more issues as compared to their colleagues working in other fields. The present study is aimed at exploring the experiences of the occupational therapists who envisage ethical issues in psycho-social rehabilitation. The present study is a 'qualitative study' in which 'content analysi's has been conducted. A 'purposive sample' consisting of twenty volunteer occupational therapists who work at mental health centers were selected. The participant’s ages ranged from 24 to 45(with average 34) years. The shortest and longest work’s experiences of the participants were one year and twenty years respectively. The participants discussed the major problems they had experienced in dealing with mentally ill people through focus group discussion (five sessions). Having the objective of the study in mind, the ethical issues were then extracted. The most important ethical issue in dealing with mentally ill patient, as stated by the participants, was the therapist's insufficient knowledge of communicating and of employing the therapeutic services. The codes extracted from this study were grouped into four main categories, namely 'compatibility of therapy with the patient's characteristics', well-being of the patients and quality of services', 'compatibility of plans with the patient's condition' and finally 'the procedure of referring the patients for occupational therapy'. The findings of the study suggest that the occupational therapists working in the field of mental health care are encountered by many ethical issues and it is imperative for the occupational therapists to upgrade their knowledge and awareness in various fields in order to settle and overcome the foregoing ethical issues. Exposing these issues and sharing them with other professionals in an attempt to explore successful and safe approaches towards improving the rehabilitation of the mentally ill people is essential as well.