The consultation model and forensic psychiatric practice.

Seymour Pollack developed three categorizing definitions which provided forensic psychiatry with a logical framework for development as a subspecialty of general psychiatry. The first definition separated the body of information related to the interaction oflaw and psychiatry required by the general psychiatrist from information specific to the subspecialty of forensic psychiatry. The general psychiatrist in any setting should practice with a working knowledge of statutory and case law affecting the practice environment. Familiarity with the law on such issues as informed consent, confidentiality, right to treatment, right to refuse treatment, and involuntary treatment, among many others, provides the practitioner with a legal framework for occurrences that are common to general psychiatric practice. Having made this distinction, Pollack turned his attention to forensic psychiatry. Pollack characterized forensic psychiatry as a subspecialty area of general psychiatry based on a consultation model. 1,2 Pollack's often debated and controversial definition of forensic psychiatry flows clearly from his view of forensic psychiatry in a consultation framework. Pollack3 defined forensic psychiatry as the "application of psychiatry to legal issues for legal ends, with the chief goal being the augmentation and support of the rule of law." Pollack's distinctions between law and psychiatry and forensic psychiatry and his definition of forensic psychiatry are familiar. His view of forensic psychiatry as a branch of consultation psychiatry is less well known and his contribution in this area has tended to be lost. In this article, we attempt to elaborate on the consultation model in some detail and to see how others have conceptualized the field of forensic psychiatry. In addition, we will look at the legal view of the forensic psychiatrist, as an expert, for the purpose of illustrating that this is a term of art in the law which has been misused in the psychiatric literature to describe the role of the forensic psychiatrist. Writings in psychiatry that have attempted to define the parameters of forensic psychiatry reflect a conflict between the attempt to remain objective