1. What you need to know about: Restraint
What is restraint?
Examples of different types of restraint
Do I have a choice?
Restraint is a technique to keep people safe and ensure they do not come to harm. At times restraint is necessary as, in order to keep someone safe, members of staff need to restrict your movement.
You can ask your named nurse for more information on restraint
Staff use restraint as the last possible option to keep you safe.
You can make an advanced agreement about how you would prefer to be treated should a situation arise where you may require restraint - for example you can request face up restraint only.
It may be that your wishes have to be overridden in order to keep you safe.
Sometimes staff will sit side by side a person on chairs to help them calm down
A member of staff may put their hands on a person’s elbow or shoulder to guide them away from the door or an incident.
If a person is at serious risk sometimes the safest place to hold them is on the floor, either face up or face down.
Sometimes medicine will be administered whilst a person is in restraint – this is called rapid tranquilisation.
Why would someone need to be restrained?
Giving us Feedback
If you want to give feedback (comments, compliments, concerns or complaints) about the service that you, or someone you care for, have received, we recommend you speak to a member of staff from that service in the first instance.
Or you can contact the Patient Support Service for help and advice.
Tel:
If you need an interpreter, or other support to give
feedback, please let us know and we will do our best to make this possible for you.
When someone is very scared or distressed they can sometimes be a risk to themselves, or to those around them
When some people are upset they may deliberately or accidentally hurt themselves and we want to keep them safe
Sometimes it is not safe for someone to leave the ward and we need to make sure they don’t leave at these times