Table 1 Contents of the questionnaire

Characteristics of the participants

Age, sex, years of experience as a medical practitioner, with/without a designated physician’s license for the MHW law, experience in assessing official involuntary hospitalizations (OIH), with/without a judgment physician’s license for the MTS Act, and experience of the MTS Act as a mental health reviewer

Changes in mental health practices from 2005 to 2010 (this series of questions is applicable only for participants engaged in clinical mental health care for more than 5 years)

Increased paperwork, greater curiosity about multiple disciplinary teams, increased workload, widespread knowledge of mental health care, greater concern about the mental health system, increase in patients with mild symptoms, development of mental health care, more frequent talks about human rights, ease of collaboration with other facilities, increased opportunity to treat patients with severe symptoms, and increased discrimination against patients with mental disorders

The recognition of changes within inpatient care settings from 2005 to 2010 (this series of question is applicable only for designated physicians working at hospitals which accept cases of OIH)

Clinical severity of OIH patients, difficulty in discharging OIH patients, recurrent hospitalization of OIH patients, and violence in hospitals

Optimization of mental health care practices

Sharing the task of assessing for OIH, follow-up for patients who do not meet the threshold for OIH, assessing the discharge of patients in OIH, and supervision of patients who undergo repeated OIH