Mental Health Lawyers

Expert lawyers for mental health providers

Independent providers play a very significant, if not dominant role, in the mental health sector.

It was reported in 2022 that the independent sector receives about 13.5% of the £14.8bn the NHS in England spends on mental health.

Whether you’re looking for advice on a specific patient related matter, support on how to navigate the complex MHA legal and regulatory landscape, acquire property or expand your business/enter into new contractual relationships, our team of specialist lawyers are on hand to help you. 

We are proud to act for some of the largest private and third sector providers of mental health care in the country.

How our mental health lawyers can advise you

Our 250 strong full-service health and social care team understand the challenges and opportunities faced by providers in the independent mental health sector. This is where we can help:

Mental health law

• From the legalities of compulsory detention to the adequacy of record keeping, we can work with you and keep you up-to-date on a wide-range of mental health issues including the interpretation and application of the Mental Health Act 1983, representation and advise at the Mental Health Review Tribunal and the lawfulness of detention, consent to treatment and funding issues. Find out more here.

Inquests

• Inquests can be high-profile occasions, raising potential issues that require careful handling and robust legal advice. Our specialist inquest solicitors are offer expert advice on all matters relating the coroners’ jurisdiction and inquests, including dealing with requests for disclosure of evidence, witness summonses and pre-inquest reviews, supporting staff through the inquest process, dealing with complex Article 2 inquests, and advocacy at inquests. Find out more here. 

Integrated care systems 

• The reforms under the Health and Care Act 2022 join up healthcare across the footprints of integrated healthcare systems. ‘Place’ is ‘the foundation’ of that integrated care. 
• Whilst the public sector is leading the focus on localised planning, integration, and consequent improvements in population health, those aims are supported and influenced by the independent sector.
• It is important to continue to build relationships locally and demonstrate value to the public sector to retain or obtain those contracts. We are perfectly placed, with our knowledge and understanding of ICS’s, to support private providers in navigating the integrated care landscape and establishing collaborative contractual relationships. 

Commercial  Healthcare

• We have extensive expertise of the procurement regulations which govern contracting with the NHS, and can advise on the current regulations and the proposed Procurement Bill and Provider Selection Regime. We advise on bidding for contracts, challenging decisions and negotiating contracts.
• We advise on all types of commercial arrangements including on franchising, supply and distribution agreements, technology transfer agreements, clinical trial agreements, research study agreements and infrastructure/ platform/software-as-a-service (IaaS/PaaS/SaaS) agreements.
• Advising on licensing and regulatory requirements for independent sector providers of NHS services under NHS England’s Independent Provider Risk Assessment Framework (IPRAF). 

Corporate Healthcare

• Our corporate team provide a unique offering to clients on corporate healthcare transactions by offering sector specialist healthcare due diligence teams to conduct detailed due diligence exercises in a very short space of time due to the size of the national healthcare due diligence team. 
• Our corporate healthcare team is comprised of Tier One ranked lawyers, able to support with corporate sales and acquisitions, listings, investments and fundraising, corporate structuring and reorganisations, and advising on share option schemes.

Technology

• Technology is radically reshaping healthcare as innovation empowers patients, opens up new possibilities for prevention and treatment, and helps funders deliver better value. We advise on all aspects of technology development and procurement, including in relation to artificial intelligence tools. We advise in particular on regulatory, data protection, intellectual property (protection and exploitation) and commercial issues. 
• We advise on cyber security requirements, including putting in place risk management frameworks to mitigate cyber risk and dealing with incidents as they arise.

Regulatory

• We advise on the regulatory framework applicable to medical devices and medicines (including novel medicines such as medical cannabis and psychedelic medicines) and can advise on MHRA and Home Office compliance.
• We advise on compliance with Competition and Markets Authority requirements as they apply both to consumers of private mental health services and to providers as regards competition.

Employment 

• Our specialist healthcare employment lawyers team provides advice and strategic guidance on the full range of employment law matters, including contracts of employment, policy documents and staff handbooks, equal pay, discrimination, victimisation and harassment, and disciplinary, dismissal and grievance procedures.

Real Estate 

• Our experienced and approachable health real estate lawyers team deliver solution focused and effective advice to a wide range of healthcare organisations, including mental health providers and clinics. 
• We focus on efficient delivery of day-to-day estates work in a cost-effective manner and build long term relationships with our clients, so we understand their estates requirements; and delivering transformational health infrastructure projects using a multi-disciplinary team approach, to bring together experienced, motivated and collaborative specialists across real estate, construction, planning, procurement and other connected disciplines.