Reflective practice in mental healthcare

This statement outlines the importance of embedding reflective practice into mental healthcare and puts forward recommendations for implementation.

Reflective practice is a professional activity that mental healthcare staff practice in a facilitated setting, during which they reflect on the impact of their work on themselves, and their peers and patients.

Existing evidence suggests it may offer various benefits, including enhancing the ability of staff to practice safely and effectively, aiding clinical learning, helping to prevent burnout, and enhancing individual and team functioning – and thus potentially helping to improve the care patients receive.

Despite this, the extent to which mental healthcare organisations facilitate reflective practice is inconsistent across the UK and provision can be lacking. This statement therefore calls for urgent action to address this, emphasising the value of reflective practice and providing guidance on how it can be more effectively embedded into services. 

It puts forward recommended actions for organisations, including allocating resources to enable reflective practices to take place and providing appropriate forms of reflective practice to meet different needs. It also offers recommendations for psychiatrists, outlining what they can do to support this cultural shift and to become more 'reflective' practitioners.