ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses with the basics of systems consultation and looks at some of the guidelines and practicalities of undertaking it. Systems consultation has been described far as a method of joint enquiry whose particular style could help clarify complex and ambiguous issues in the healthcare field and assist decision making. Conceivably systems consultation's principles might provide a viable framework for real, as opposed to pretend, democracy, but that is a question for political philosophers. Consultation brings together three areas which unfortunately tend to drift apart: clinical practice, learning and research. The consultee or consultees must be in a position to put into practice whatever emerges from consultation. In cross-agency work (for example, meeting nurses from a number of practices, or counsellors with a number of clinical attachments) people might allege things about identifiable units or organisations which they would hesitate to say about individual people.
