The Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS)1 were

legal framework for people with a mental disorder, over the age of 18, who lack capacity to make decisions about care or treatment in hospitals or care homes, when circumstances amounting to deprivation of liberty are required to provide such care. Leading up to and following introduction of the safeguards, there has been concern surrounding their complexity, how they should be implemented and how they work in parallel with current mental health legislation.2-5 A particular concern has been that as deprivation of liberty is not clearly defined in the DoLS Code of Practice,1 the DoLS are not user-friendly and are open to wide interpretation.6 Aims The purpose of this study was to gauge the level of agreement between assessments of deprivation of liberty made by lawyers and those made by different groups of mental health professionals. The aims were to:. compare judgements made about deprivation of liberty by different groups of mental health professionals and lawyers;. describe the interrater reliability of deprivation of liberty judgements within each professional group and for the total of all judgements made;. examine whether rates of identification of deprivation of liberty differ between different groups of professionals