An overview of the research on physical restraint in Norwegian adult psychiatric hospitals.

What is it about?

Physical restraint is an emergency intervention that is sometimes used in psychiatric institutions to control patients that pose an imminent physical danger. The article describes the research on physical restraint in Norway. Most of the studies were on rates of restraint, but there were also some studies on perceptions of patients and staff, case studies, and ethnographic studies.

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Why is it important?

A main finding was that there are differences in use between wards and institutions, which in part may be explained by differences in patient populations. Staff appear to be less negative to the use of restraint than patients.

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