PS 1996; 47:760-761
Copyright © 1996 by American Psychiatric Association
A survey of preferred terms for users of mental health services
KT Mueser, SM Glynn, PW Corrigan and W Baber
Department of psychiatry, Dartmouth Medical School in Hanover, New Hampshire, USA.
To determine how users of mental health services would like to be addressed
by professionals, a survey of 302 persons participating in a variety of
inpatient and outpatient psychiatric programs was conducted. Forty-five
percent of the sample preferred the term "client," 20 percent preferred the
term "patient," 8 percent preferred the term "consumer," and 27 percent
either expressed no clear preference for one term or provided another term.
The results suggest that no one term is favored by users of mental health
services. Professionals and persons receiving mental health services are
encouraged to talk over individual preferences to help establish a working
alliance.
