Canadian Guidelines for Forensic Psychiatry Assessment and Report Writing
The guidelines are intended as a review of legal and forensic psychiatric principles to offer practical guidance and be a resource for learners, early career forensic psychiatrists and others. This project represents a significant advance for forensic psychiatry in Canada, and we hope they will serve as a helpful resource to CAPL members and the field of forensic psychiatry going forward.

These documents do not, however, necessarily represent the views of all members of CAPL. Further, they should not be construed as dictating the standard for forensic evaluations. Although they are intended to inform practice, they do not present all currently acceptable ways of performing forensic psychiatry evaluations and following these guidelines does not lead to a guaranteed outcome. Differing facts, clinical factors, relevant statutes, administrative and case law, and the psychiatrist’s clinical judgement determine how to proceed in any individual forensic assessment.

CAPL has also developed a guideline checklist based on the General Principles that can be used for any third-party assessment for self-reflection, peer review, and supervision:

CAPL is very interested in and looks forward to your comments and feedback on the guidelines.

Note: It is the policy of CAPL to review each position paper, policy statement and clinical practice guideline every five years after publication or last review. Any such document on the CAPL website that has been published more than five years ago and does not explicitly state it has been reviewed and retained as an official document of the academy, either with revisions or as originally published, should be considered as an historical reference document only.