In this project area, interdisciplinary clinical-ethical manuals will be developed with the involvement of relevant stakeholders, which will provide concrete recommendations for psychiatric practice based on the results from project areas I–VI.

A first manual will provide concrete advice for ethical problems that frequently occur in daily psychiatric clinical practice. Clinical ethics consultation is very useful for the appropriate treatment of people with mental disorders as ethical questions and dilemmas are part of daily clinical practice. Nevertheless, an exhaustive systematic implementation of clinical ethics consultation has so far been missing.

A second manual will contain recommendations for Advance Care Planning (ACP) in psychiatry. The ACP allows for the implementation of a mental health service users’ treatment preferences at a time when they are no longer capable of giving consent. It is characterized by its procedural accompaniment and support of patients in documenting their wishes for future treatment and ensuring the local structural conditions for its implementation. In psychiatric practice, systematic ACP is less established and is also handled very differently from region to region.

Against this backdrop, the project aims at developing a standardized template of advance directives for the clinical manual on ACP. Additionally, a practical guideline with clinical examples for the implementation of ACP in daily clinical practice will be developed.