Volume 28, Issue 2 e70239
REVIEW ARTICLE
Open Access

Navigating Power Imbalances and Stigma in Mental Healthcare. Patient-Reported Barriers and Facilitators to Participation in Shared Decision-Making in Mental Health Care, a Qualitative Meta-Summary

Lien Mertens

Corresponding Author

Lien Mertens

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Correspondence: Lien Mertens ([email protected])

Contribution: Conceptualization, Writing - original draft, Formal analysis, Methodology

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Joris Vandenberghe

Joris Vandenberghe

Psychiatry Research Group, Department of Neurosciences KU Leuven, UPC KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Geertruida Bekkering

Geertruida Bekkering

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Belgian Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Karin Hannes

Karin Hannes

Research Group SoMeTHin'K, Faculty of Social Science, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Belgium; JBI Belgium: A JBI Affiliated Group, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing, Supervision

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Nicolas Delvaux

Nicolas Delvaux

Belgian Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, Leuven, Belgium

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Campus Kortrijk (KULAK) - KU Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Pieter Van Bostraeten

Pieter Van Bostraeten

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Jasmien Jaeken

Jasmien Jaeken

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Writing - review & editing

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Bert Aertgeerts

Bert Aertgeerts

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Belgian Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Supervision, Writing - review & editing, Conceptualization

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Mieke Vermandere

Mieke Vermandere

Department of Public Health and Primary Care, KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Contribution: Supervision, Writing - review & editing

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First published: 07 April 2025

ABSTRACT

Background

The use of shared decision-making (SDM) in mental healthcare has been viewed as at least as important as its use in non-mental healthcare settings, but it still does not routinely take place in this setting. To further explore SDM processes with people with lived experience, we provide a qualitative meta-summary on patient-reported barriers and facilitators to participation in SDM within the context of mental healthcare.

Methods

Within the set of selected studies for a larger qualitative meta-summary, using five databases, we selected the studies that had surveyed patients with mental illness for further analysis in this paper. Search terms were based on the concepts: ‘decision making’, ‘patient participation’, ‘patient perceptions’ and ‘study design’ of patient reporting, including patient surveys, interviews and focus groups.

Results

Out of the 90 studies that had been selected for the larger review, we selected 13 articles concerning mental illness for more detailed analysis in this review. In total, we identified 29 different influencing factors and we found 6 major barriers: ‘Lack of choice’, ‘Not being respected as a person’, ‘Feeling stigma from physician’, ‘Disease burden’, ‘Power imbalance’ and ‘Low self-efficacy to participate’. ‘Clear information provision about options’, ‘Being respected as a person, being taken into account’, ‘Good physician-patient relationship’ and ‘Belief in the importance of one's own role’ were the main facilitators.

Conclusions

Stigma and self-stigma still seem to persist in mental healthcare and continue to suppress patients' self-efficacy to participate in SDM in this setting. There is much discussion of inclusion and diversity worldwide, and these themes are just as topical for patients with mental health problems. Further work seems necessary to eradicate all stigma and self-stigma in this setting when striving for care that could be ‘as shared as possible’.

Patient and Public Contribution

The authors wish to thank Mr. Walter Geuens, a person with lived experience in mental healthcare, for his careful reading and thorough feedback on the final paper.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Data Availability Statement

The authors have nothing to report.

The full text of this article hosted at iucr.org is unavailable due to technical difficulties.