Consumers' perspectives on helpful and hindering factors in mental health treatment

We summarize the four papers in this issue by consumers evaluating their mental health treatment, focusing on aspects of their treatment that they collectively found helpful and hindering. These factors include the context of treatment, the therapy relationship, interventions used and issues addressed, helpful experiences outside the mental health system, and hindering views of mental illness and treatment. We then present comments by two clients in outpatient therapy on the same topic. Research on clients' perceptions of their outpatient psychotherapy is discussed in reference to these six consumer perspectives, and future directions for therapists and researchers are suggested.