Capacity To Express Consent

The discussion around capacity is a very tricky one and can be very complicated draw conclusion about that, because there are many factors that influence the indivividual's capacity to express consent. Mental and physical factor have a big influence in express consent, for example if someone has mental health problem such as dementia, then it may be assumed that the individual is not able to make his/her decisions and does not have the capacity to consent, this is not in fact the case because there are many factors that we need to considered, infact everyone's capacity to make decision depend also on the support and knowledge that they have, for example they may require support to understand what the option are and this does not mean they don't have the capacity to make decision. The ability to understand and make a decision when it need to be made is called "mental capacity".

The Mental Capacity Act cteates a framework to provide protection for …show more content…
A person may be descibed as mentally incapacitated for a number of reasons, but some reasons can be temporary, for example an individual can take some sedatory medicines and so his capacity to express consent is not available, another example can be when an individual has a long -term illness, such as mental illness, coma or unconsciousness. Some people may have capacity to consent to some treatment or care provisions but not others, for example , people suffering from the early stages of dementia would probably still have the capacity to make many straighforward decisions about their treatment or care but may lack the capacity to make very complex decisions.

A person may demonstrate their consent in different ways: informed consent, implied consent, written or