Patient Rights

Article 35

1. Any person with mental disorder has the right to the best available medical and health care services.

2. Any person suffering from mental disorder or being treated as such has to be treated with humanity and with respect for human dignity, and to be protected from any form of economic, sexual or other kind of exploitation, from harmful and degrading treatment.

3. There shall be no discrimination on the grounds of mental disorder.

4. Any person suffering from mental disorder has the right to exercise all civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights as recognized in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as in other international conventions and treaties in this field, to which Romania has adhered or is a party, except in cases specified by law.

5. Any person suffering from mental disorder has the right to live and work, to the extent possible, in the community. Local public administration, through its competent organs, ensures the patient?s integration or reintegration in occupational activities adequate to his or her health condition and capacity of social and professional reintegration.

6. Any person with mental disorder has the right to receive community care, as defined in the present law.

Article 36

1. Any patient with mental disorder has the right to:

• His or her recognition as a person before the law;
• Privacy;
• Freedom of communication, especially with other persons in the health care facility; freedom to send and receive private communication without any kind of censorship; freedom to receive, in private, visits from a counsel or personal or legal representative and, at all possible times, from other visitors; and freedom of access to postal and telephone services, as well as to newspapers, radio and television;
• Freedom of religion or belief

2. The environment and living conditions in mental health facilities shall be as close as possible to those of the normal life of persons of similar age

3. For spending their free time all patients have the right to:

• Facilities for education
• Possibilities to purchase or receive items necessary for daily living, recreation and communication
• Facilities allowing the patient?s engagement in active occupation adapted to his or her social and cultural background, encouragement for using these facilities and vocational rehabilitation measures suitable for promoting reintegration in the community.

4. No patient can be compelled to forced labour.

5. The activity carried out by a patient in a mental health facility cannot allow for his or her physical or psychical exploitation.

Article 37

Clinical studies and experimental treatments, psychosurgery or other treatments capable of provoking harm to the patient?s integrity, with irreversible consequences, can only be applied to a person with mental disorder with his or her informed consent, and only if the committee of ethics of the psychiatric unit has given its consent, declaring itself convinced that the patient has indeed given his or her genuine informed consent, and that the treatment serves the interest of the patient.

Article 38

1. From the very moment of admission in a health care facility every patient has to be informed, as soon as possible, in a form and language that he or she can understand, of his or her rights, according to the law, and this information will be accompanied by explanation of these rights and means of their exercising.

2. In case the patient is not able to understand this information and as long as this incapacity lasts, his or her rights will be communicated to the personal or legal representative.

3. A patient who retains his or her psychical capacity has the right to nominate a person who has to be informed on his or her behalf, as well as a person empowered to represent his or her interests besides the authorities of the facility.

Article 39

Persons serving sentences of imprisonment for criminal offences, or those who are otherwise detained in the course of criminal proceedings or investigations, and who are determined to have a mental disorder, as well as persons admitted in psychiatric hospitals as a consequence of application of high security medical
measures prescribed by the Code of Criminal Procedure shall receive available medical and mental health care, according to the law.