Compulsory admission of the mentally ill: adequacy of documentation.

The issues that are involved in the compulsory detention and treatment of persons with mental illness are complex. There has been an improvement in the adequacy of documentation of such persons in the first five years of operation of the new South Australian Mental Health Act, 1976-1977. However, an appreciable proportion of documents still do not appear to comply adequately with the statutory requirements. This may be related not only to shortcomings in the medical documentation, but also to ambiguities and possible overlapping in the criteria for compulsory detention and treatment.