BACKGROUND

Services for crisis resolution provided by home treatment teams are recent developments in the mental health care scene. There is a lack of systematized reviews in the service users' responses to these services.

AIM

To systematize the existing knowledge regarding the service users' experiences with crisis resolution and home treatment (CR/HT) teams in order to explore ways to develop this form of service further.

METHOD

A systematic review of the periodical literature and research reports on CR/HT was carried out for the period from January 1995 to January 2009.

RESULTS

A total of 13 papers, one RCT review and two reports were identified, including both qualitative and quantitative studies. Although these studies provided few in-depth details, three major themes as the characteristics of CR/HT teams are extracted as: (a) access and availability, (b) being understood as "normal" human beings, and (c) dealing with crises in an everyday life context.

CONCLUSIONS

The findings suggest that the key positive characteristics of help in crisis situations are intrinsically tied to the values and principles undergirding CR/HT services. The commitment to community-based services, the philosophy of partnership, and user-empowerment seem to the base from which these three themes of positive experiences emerged.