Section 29

Abstract

The wording of the Mental Health Act, 1959 makes it clear that an application under Section 29 replaces both the old Urgency Order and the D.A.O.'s three-day order as a means of compulsory admission to a mental hospital or the psychiatric ward of a general hospital. It was intended to be limited to cases where the patient's mind is so acutely deranged as to make him a grave and immediate danger to himself or others, so that the delay in obtaining a second medical recommendation required for admission under Section 25 might spell disaster.