Involuntary commitment

Involuntary commitment is legal authorization to detain someone for mental health evaluation or treatment without their consent, under criteria set by law.

Dangerousness standard: A legal test that treats serious risk of harm as a basis for restricting liberty. Many commitment laws use predicted danger to self or others as a detention criterion.
Voluntary psychiatric admission: Hospital admission for psychiatric care that a person agrees to enter. It differs from commitment because admission begins with the person's consent.
Deinstitutionalization: The shift from long-term psychiatric hospitals toward community-based mental health care. It changed the institutions that commitment laws were designed to regulate.
Due process: Legal protections requiring fair procedures before the state deprives a person of liberty or other protected interests. Commitment procedures must address the severe liberty restriction through notice, evidence, and review.
Gravely disabled: A legal status describing inability to meet basic needs because of mental illness. Some jurisdictions allow commitment when severe impairment prevents self-care, even without a danger finding.
Assisted outpatient treatment: A court-ordered plan requiring certain people to receive psychiatric care while living in the community. It can impose treatment without hospital detention, though its scope and enforcement vary.
Parens patriae: A doctrine giving the state authority to protect people considered unable to protect their own interests. It supplies one historical rationale for state-initiated psychiatric intervention.
Psychiatric diagnosis: The classification of mental and behavioral conditions using clinical criteria. A diagnosis may inform commitment decisions but does not alone establish legal grounds for detention.
Emergency psychiatric hold: A short-term legal detention for urgent psychiatric evaluation, usually initiated without a prior court hearing. It is a common first stage before a longer commitment decision.
Guardianship: A legal arrangement giving an appointed person authority to make specified decisions for another person. It concerns decision-making authority, not by itself permission to detain someone for psychiatric care.

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