Putting Lived Experience at the Centre: A Critical Review of Multidisciplinary, Person-Centred Mental Health Care

Purpose: Person-centred care is widely endorsed in mental health policy yet remains inconsistently enacted in multidisciplinary practice, particularly where services default to diagnostic dominance, risk management, and service-led priorities. This critical review examines what is required to operationalise person-centred, rights-based care across disciplines and settings, positioning lived and living experience as core expertise rather than a supplementary perspective and considering implications for suicide prevention. Methods: A critical review of peer-reviewed and grey literature was undertaken, focusing on person-centred and multidisciplinary mental health care. Five commonly used approaches were compared: the Optimal Health Program, the Strengths Model, Open Dialogue, traditional case management, and Behaviour Support Planning. Models were examined against mechanisms consistently associated with high-quality care, including supported decision-making, shared formulation, relational continuity, lived experience leadership, integration of physical and social determinants of health, and management of coercion risk in acute settings. Results: Alignment with person-centred, rights-based care was strongest when supported decision-making was routine rather than discretionary, care was relational and meaning-oriented and lived and living experience leadership was embedded with formal authority and resourcing. Approaches that are easier to standardise and scale were more likely to drift toward managerial and task-focused practices unless deliberately redesigned to protect agency, relational safety, and person-defined goals. These mechanisms were particularly important for suicide prevention and for people experiencing intersecting vulnerabilities, including trauma, disability, chronic physical illness, substance use, housing insecurity, family violence, racism, stigma, justice involvement, neurodivergence, and geographic isolation. Conclusion: Rather than advocating a single branded model, this review supports a shift toward system-wide mechanisms and minimum standards that travel with the person across settings. Prioritising supported decision-making, shared formulation, relational continuity, equity-oriented responses, and lived and living experience governance offers a practical pathway to make person-centred care more consistent, accountable, and safer, particularly in acute, crisis, and rural contexts, to embed suicide prevention within everyday multidisciplinary practice. Plain Language Summary: Mental health services often say they provide person-centred care. This means care should respect a person’s goals, values, and life context. In reality, many services still focus mainly on diagnosis, risk management, and system rules. This can leave people feeling unheard, especially during crisis or hospital care. This review explores what factors help multidisciplinary mental health teams (teams made up of different professions) deliver care that is genuinely led by the person. To achieve this, research papers, policy documents, and practice frameworks were compared as to how well they support key elements of person-centred care. Five common approaches used in services, including programs focused on strengths, self-management, dialogue with families and networks, care coordination, and behaviour support planning, were additionally compared. Findings highlight that good care does not depend on choosing the “right” branded model, rather a small set of practices that should happen everywhere. These include: ● Supporting people to make their own decisions, with help if needed ● Building shared understandings of a person’s experiences, strengths, and life situation, not just symptoms ● Maintaining trusting relationships across service changes ● Including people with lived and living experience ● in leadership roles ● Addressing physical health, housing, safety, and social connection as part of care These practices are also critical for suicide prevention. When people feel listened to, respected, and involved in decisions, they are more likely to seek help early, talk about suicidal thoughts, and stay connected to support. When services protect these practices, people are more likely to feel respected, safe, and involved. Findings support system changes that make these person-centred practices standard, not optional. Keywords: person-centred care, multidisciplinary teams, lived and living experience, recovery-oriented practice, mental health services, suicide prevention