What Clinicians Say About the Experience of Working With Individuals on Community Treatment Orders

Objective:Community treatment orders (CTOs) refer to a variety of legal schemes that require a person with a serious mental illness to follow a plan of treatment and supervision while living in the community. Use of CTOs has been controversial, and they have been the subject of a considerable amount of quantitative and qualitative research. This article reports the results of a systematic review of qualitative studies focused on understanding the views and experiences of clinicians who work with individuals on CTOs.Methods:Relevant databases and gray literature were searched for articles that used a qualitative methodology for data collection and analysis to examine clinicians’ perspectives. CTOs were defined as various legal schemes, including court-ordered outpatient commitment and renewable conditional-leave provisions initiated while a person is an inpatient in a psychiatric unit. Mandatory treatment and supervision required after a person has been charged with or convicted of committing a criminal of...