Abstract
This chapter identifies the need, globally, for secure mental health provision and presents an overview of the history and development of secure care. It charts its social evolution, from origins in the earliest psychiatric hospitals, to growth into the complex pattern of forensic and secure mental health service specialisation that exists in the most advanced societies today. A narrative shape is given to historical patterns of innovation, differentiation and decline in secure services, within an appreciative critique of the achievements so far in this important area. We offer a sociological as much as a mental health professional view, although the chapter is intended as a balance to the abundance of critical sociology of psychiatric hospitals, for example as ‘total institutions’.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Handbook of secure care |
| Editors | Geoffrey L. Dickens, Philip A. Sugarman, Marco M. Picchioni |
| Place of Publication | London |
| Publisher | RCPsych Publications |
| Pages | 1-14 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781909726369 |
| Publication status | Published - Jul 2015 |
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Cite this
Sugarman, P., & Dickens, G. L. (2015). The evolution of secure and forensic mental healthcare. In G. L. Dickens, P. A. Sugarman, & M. M. Picchioni (Eds.), Handbook of secure care (pp. 1-14). London: RCPsych Publications.