‘Dale’: an interpretative phenomenological analysis of a service-user’s experience with a Crisis Resolution / Home Treatment team in the UK

What is known about the subject? This paper describes Crisis Resolution/Home Treatment (CRHT) teams, which are part of mental health services in the UK. CRHT is expected to assist individuals in building resilience, and work within a recovery approach. What this paper adds to existing knowledge? This paper arises from an interview with one individual, Dale, as part of a larger study exploring service users’ experiences of CRHT. It adds to the body of narrative knowledge in CRHT through Dale’s co-authorship of this paper, reflecting on his original interview four years later, with co-authors providing critical interpretation of his experience, in turn supported by cognate literature. What are the implications for practice? Implications for practice are considered, themselves mediated through Dale’s own descriptions of how CRHT interventions impacted upon him. These impacts are analysed with respect to three themes: Resilience, Recovery and Power. It is centrally contended that clinicians need to more clearly comprehend three core matters. Firstly, what resilience ‘is’ for service users as well as the complex process through which these individuals move in developing resilience. Secondly, the distinction that service users might make between ‘recovery’ and ‘functionality’, and how this in turn can impact on individuals both in personal and socio-economic sense. Finally, the mechanics of power within CRHT contexts, and how these interpersonal dynamics can affect the relationship between service user and clinician in practice.