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The moral content of psychiatric treatment

Complex Needs Service, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford

Hanna Pickard, DPhil^*

All Souls College, Oxford, UK

Correspondence: Steve Pearce, Complex Needs Service, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Manzil Way, Oxford OX4 1XE, UK. Email: steve.pearce{at}obmh.nhs.uk

Declaration of interest

None.

Steve Pearce is a consultant psychiatrist and programme director of the Oxfordshire Complex Needs Service, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust. Hanna Pickard is a philosopher of mind and psychiatry at All Souls College, Oxford, and a therapist with the Oxfordshire Complex Needs Service.

^* Both authors contributed equally to the work.

Psychiatric treatment can enhance human morality. It can promote the emergence of moral motives and intentions, aid in the acquisition of skills essential to moral action, and help to develop the ability to apply moral understanding and skills in particular circumstances. Good psychiatric practice demands an honest appraisal of its moral dimension.

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