ABSTRACT
Knowledge of capacity and consent is vital to ensure providing treatment within General Medical Council guidelines and the law. For a patient to give valid consent, they must have the capacity to make the decision being asked of them. Patients must always be assumed to have capacity, unless it has been established that they do not. Capacity relates to the decision at hand; a patient may be perfectly able to agree to provide a blood sample, but lack the capacity to consent to major surgery. Patients must be given as much support as they require to help them make their own decisions where possible. Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards was added to the Mental Capacity Act in 2007, in order to protect vulnerable adults from being unlawfully deprived of their liberty. Sometimes it is necessary to restrain a patient, either physically or chemically, to prevent them from harming themselves or others.
