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Table 1 The list of published articles by the team on mental health and substance abuse practices related to collaboration and recovery-orientation used for the meta-synthesis

From: A heuristic model for collaborative practice – Part 1: a meta-synthesis of empirical findings on collaborative strategies in community mental health and substance abuse practice

Publication

Research questions

Method

Research participants

Themes and Meanings

Borg and Kristiansen [17]

The aim of this research is to understand the characteristics of helping relationships in mental health services, including the ways in which recovery-oriented professionals can most effectively collaborate with service users.

Individual interviews

Persons with lived experience of severe mental illness

Discover fellow humanity (Being seen as a person; Being seen as “both-and” and” ill-and-well”

Available everyday helpers (Just being there—finding the time to be there)

Experiencing what is “therapeutic” (Inspiring hope and courage; Being trustful)

Breaking the rules (Being the personal relationships as the base for professional ones; Being supportive with necessary control)

Borg et al. [18]

This article focuses on the role that material resources, particularly having a house or an apartment, as well as the associated meanings that make such places ‘‘home,’’ play in processes of recovery from severe mental illness

Individual interviews

Persons with lived experience of severe mental illness

Dealing and living with major struggles:

  Poverty, unemployment, substandard living and homelessness

Importance of having a home:

  As a place of growth, development and control

  A need for balancing the need for socialization with privacy

  A home as a secure base

Karlsson et al. [19]

How do CRHT team members understand and negotiate their understanding of a person experience a mental health crisis? The aim of this paper is to gain a deeper understanding by exploring how the team members reflect upon the experiences of their understandings and negotiations related to mental health crisis

Focus group interviews

Professionals

Description of mental crisis and which implications this understanding has for working in teams

  Understandings of crisis

  Negotiations on crisis

Borg and Davidson [20]

The present study was intended to contribute to a growing body of knowledge that attempts to explore, understand, and address severe mental health problems within the context of the person’s everyday life

Individual interviews

Persons in recovery from severe mental illness

Themes for recovery:

  Begin normal

  Just doing it

  Making life easier

  Being good to oneself

Implications for user/professional relationships:

  Remaining open to opportunities which present themselves

Supporting users’ efforts to function as citizens

Borg et al. [21]

To elicit and learn from service users’ experiences about the subjective meanings of crisis and what kind of help will be most effective in resolving mental health crises

Focus group interviews

Persons with experiences of mental health crisis

Experiences of mental health crisis:

  Crisis as multifaceted and varied experiences

  Losing the skills and structure of everyday life

  The complexities involved in family support

Implications for practice:

  Supporting person-in-context perspectives and person-centred ways of working

Sundet [22]

This qualitative study examined how a group of families and their therapists described helpful therapy

Individual and family interviews

Therapists, and users of family therapy

Helpful therapy is: The helpful relationship, the helpful participation and the helpful conversations

Therapists:

  “To get a taste of it” (Sharing experiences; Participating, attaining mutual definitions; blurring the differences)

  “The lingering conversation and the big toolbox (Questioning; Lingering; Content; Nuancing the nuances)

  “To be where people are” (Listing, talking seriously, and believing; Being flexible; Generosity)

Family members (Users):

  The helpful conversation (Asking questions, giving time, and structuring the work; Giving and receiving feedback; Reformulation)

  The helpful participation (Using professional knowledge; Having many possibilities; Understanding though participation)

  The helpful relationship (Generating collaboration; Giving of oneself; Fighting violation, disparagement, and degradation)

Ervik et al. [23]

The aim of the study was to explore and interpret milieu therapists’ experiences of collaboration between employees and residents at a low threshold accommodation center for homeless men

Focus group interviews

Professionals

Unpredictable and challenging weekdays, and experiences with collaboration was gathered in the following:

  The knowledge and experiences of the professionals

  The spontaneous and informal

  Conditions employees do not control

Grasping the moment expressed understanding of wholeness about collaboration between professionals and patients

Borg et al. [24]

The objective of this study was to explore and learn from relatives’ experiences about the subjective meanings of crisis and meaningful and efficient crisis support

Focus group interviews

Family members

Relatives experience of mental crisis:

  Experiences of rejection and responsibility

  Living with contradictions

  The art of balancing openness

Sundet [25]

The aim of this qualitative study was to explicate how therapists describe and evaluate the use of two measures, the Session Rating Scale and the Outcome Rating Scale, used as feedback tools.

Individual interviews

Professionals

Therapist perspectives on the use of feedback from patients/families with feedback scales as conversational tools

  Conversational types: getting feedback, create structure, make discoveries, separation between person and problem, getting results

  Upholding collaboration

Karlsson et al. [26]

The aim was to explore service users’ and professionals’ subjective experiences of attending the study course together, and the following two research questions were asked of patients and therapists: (1) How would you describe your experiences in relation to the content and the processes of the study course? (2) In what ways has the study course had an impact on your own awareness and role in the process of empowerment and recovery?

Focus group interviews

Patient-therapist pairs

Recognizing common humanity and common strength (Sharing the humanity being equals; Being together in the sense of community)

Being accepted as a person (Respect for individuality)

An inviting control-free zone (Letting go of controls; Working together and partaking in activities together)

Doing things differently (begin free of contextual constraints)

Borg and Karlsson [27]

The objective of the present paper is to explore philosophical ideas and experiences of a home and the opportunities and dilemmas of home treatment

Two studies:

1. Individual interviews

2. Focus group interviews

1. Service users

2. Professionals

The home as an arena for treatment, rehabilitation and caring

Self-control, safety, beneficence and autonomy in both professional and patient

Ness et al. [28]

The purpose of this paper is to describe parents’ experiences of collaboration with mental health practitioners when working with young adults with co-occurring mental health and substance use problems

Focus group interviews

Clinicians in CMH care

Walking along side (Be with them)

Maintaining human relationships (Be there; Continuing with relationships and not rejecting)

Maneuvering relationships and services (being coordinators; Being advocates)

Sundet [29]

The aim of this study is to explain how families within mental health for children and adolescents evaluate and describe the use of two measures, the Session Rating Scale and the Outcome Rating Scale, as feedback tools

Interviews (CQR)

Family members receiving MHC

Practice using ORS and SRS

  Confirmation and confirmation of functions

  Difficulties (Difficulties associated with the lack of information with administration of the scales; Difficulties associated with the form of the scales; Difficulties associated with special situation and consequences of having the ratings)

Ness et al. [30]

The purpose of this paper is to describe parents’ experiences of collaboration with mental health practitioners around young adults struggling with co-occurring mental health and substance use problems

Focus group interviews

Family members/significant others of young adult users

Negotiating partnerships (Being appropriately involved through negotiated involvement)

Incomprehensive services (Helping to understand the dynamics of services)

Being the users’ advocates

Sundet et al. [31]

Drawing from experiences of a family-based practice the article seeks to give in-depth specification of processes embedded within collaborative practice that is built around turntaking

Clinical encounters

Family therapy session

Turn-taking

  Negotiating for common goals (Being aware of one’s own goals and expanding understandings of one another; Moving with the differences)

  Putting differences to work (Moving along)

Soggiu and Biong [32]

The purpose of the study was to investigate and describe the experiences of social workers with overdoses and overdose deaths. The research question was: How do social workers describe their experiences with overdoses and overdose deaths of clients with an opiate dominated misuse of injections.

Focus group interviews

Individual interviews

Professionals

Experiences of working with overdoses and death from overdoses

  Difficulties in planning the work

  What the clients needed

  Life is not lived within the healthcare system

Ness et al. [33]

The aim of this article is to explore and describe the experiences of young adults with co-occurring mental health and substance use problems perspectives on collaborative practices with practitioners.

Individual interviews

Young adult service users

Don’t fix me or judge me

Someone to sort issues out with

Not giving up

Practical help

Sundet [34]

The chapter summarizes experiences with the use of two measures, the Session Rating Scale and the Outcome Rating Scale, as feedback tools, with the aim of explicating how a family team in mental health for children and adolescents has come to understand their work with feedback from the families

Summery of empirical findings and clinical experiences

Family members receiving MHC

Professionals

ORS and SRS as conversational tools

To be both client—directed and outcome-informed

Service users at the core of therapeutic work

To follow the client and be challenged by data