This page was translated automatically from Turkish. Read the original

This page is an AI-assisted Turkish summary of the study presented at the 26th World Congress of Psychiatry. The study belongs to the presenting authors; please refer to the original source when citing it.

EV1287

Structural Stigma Evaluation Tool (SSET): a new reflective assessment tool for addressing mental health inequities in emergency departments

THE STRUCTURAL STIGMA EVALUATION TOOL (SSET): A NOVEL REFLECTIVE ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENT FOR ADDRESSING MENTAL HEALTH INEQUITY IN EMERGENCY DEPARTMENTS

SSET is a new reflective assessment tool that fills a gap in the field by enabling emergency department teams to identify and score sources of structural stigma across six domains and develop a prioritized action plan.

The study aimed to develop the Structural Stigma Evaluation Tool (SSET) to address the lack of a validated tool for assessing structural stigma in emergency department (ED) settings. SSET operationalizes Livingston's 2021 framework, drawing on iterative literature synthesis, clinical expertise, and qualitative findings from phase 1 of the EMBER study; this qualitative phase involved 46 participants (patients, families, physicians, nurses, and protective services staff) who identified structural stigma as the predominant issue. The tool comprises six domains: resource allocation, denial of care, fragmented care, practitioner practices, negative experiences, and coercive approaches. Scoring uses a scale from 1 to 5, with levels defined, respectively, as emerging awareness, early development, developing practice, advancing practice, and leading practice. The process involves reviewing the tool together as a team; gathering evidence from multiple sources, such as patient experience data, administrative data, direct observation, and policy review; scoring collaboratively while seeking consensus and recording disagreements; reflecting on the theme within each domain; identifying 2–3 priority areas based on scores, feasibility, and impact; and developing an action plan that includes timelines, responsibilities, and reassessment dates. Prioritization criteria include impact, feasibility, urgency, equity, and the priorities of people with lived experience. The authors state that SSET offers a practical, scorable tool for identifying structural sources of mental health inequities in emergency departments, with pilot testing and psychometric validation studies planned.

All WCP 2026 summaries