The luxury of time: A reflexive thematic analysis of omnipresence, contradiction, and passivity in interpreter-mediated Mental Health Act Assessments

This paper explores the notion of time when undertaking interpreter-mediated Mental Health Act Assessments (MHAAs) from the perspective of Approved Mental Health Professionals (AMHPs). It is based on one theme that emerged from a reflexive thematic analysis of 17 semi-structured interviews with AMHPs undertaken as part of a larger corpus (Young et al., 2023). We found when carrying out interpreter-mediated MHAAs, AMHPs perceive time as luxury; something that they do not have in abundance, and which is made more problematic through the additional exigences when an interpreter is required. The luxury of time to which participants refer is determined ostensibly by resource availability underpinned by risk. Systemic and structural barriers also pertain. Driven by time’s omnipresence, these findings demonstrate fluctuations in how AMHPs use spoken/signed language interpreters and give rise to contradiction and sometimes passivity in practice. These findings are important considerations when undertaking any social work service that might require interpreter-meditation and are especially significant during a MHAA when a person’s liberty is at issue.