Healthcare Professionals’ Experiences of Recovery-Oriented Collaboration Between Mental Health Centres and Municipalities: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Collaboration within mental health centres and with municipalities in Western European healthcare has presented challenges due to structural and cultural disparities. The Danish healthcare system faces obstacles that impact mental healthcare services, particularly in cross-sectorial cooperation. Our aim was to investigate healthcare professionals’ experiences of recovery-oriented collaboration within a mental healthcare setting across hospitals and municipalities to gather a deeper understanding of this issue. Twenty-four employees were purposively sampled from mental health centres in Copenhagen and focus group interviews were conducted to explore their perceptions of working together. Inductive content analysis was used to analyse the data and identify themes and categories. The participants emphasised challenges in communication and coordination to improve collaboration within across the two sectors. This study can contribute to a greater understanding of collaboration between mental health centres and municipalities. It aims to inspire improvements in communication, coordination, and the optimisation of mental health service delivery across sectors.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 FACT Team stands for Forensic Assertive Community Treatment Team. It is a specialised, inter-sectorial mental health service model that provides intensive and comprehensive community-based care for individuals with serious mental illnesses (Sood et al., 2017).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.