The right to refuse treatment: a broad view.

Psychiatry shares with other professions certain common characteristics. Sociologically, a profession is defined as an occupation based on a unique theoretical and scientific body of knowledge, whose practitioners have a service orientation, and autonomy in the performance of their work (Hughes, 1965). In addition to these three core characteristics, psychiatry is beginning to experience a trend which has been occurring in other professions. This trend has been referred to as "the revolt of client" (Haug and Sussman, 1969) and is surfacing in psychiatry under the label of the patient's right to refuse treatment. In this presentation, we wish to sketch out some of the major issues surrounding this complex question of the right of mental patients to refuse treatment.