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News Article
CQC tells provider to inform police of staff assault on patient
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Allegations of staff assaulting patients at a mental health hospital have been uncovered for a second time, one year after the Care Quality Commission (CQC) first raised concerns over potential abuse at the unit. The regulator criticised Broomhill Hospital in Northampton in a report issued this week after inspectors found details of three alleged assaults by staff against patients. The unit is run by independent sector provider St Matthew’s Healthcare, but treats NHS patients. In May 2020, the CQC placed the hospital into special measures amid concerns it was failing to protect patients against abuse. Patients had raised concerns to inspectors over poor staff attitudes and made allegations that two had physically assaulted patients. A second inspection this year was triggered by further whistleblowing concerns from patients and staff. Following the most recent inspection, which took place this February, the CQC has again raised warnings about staff allegedly assaulting patients. The staff members involved in all three incidents were dismissed and the CQC has asked the provider to inform the police of one incident. According to the report: “Staff had not always treated patients with compassion and kindness… [or] been discreet, respectful, and responsive when caring for patients. Two patients told us that their experience in the hospital was ‘terrible’. Two different patients told us that they had observed staff shout at patients. Another patient described Broomhill as ‘the worst hospital they had been in’, adding that they were not happy with the care provided.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 22 April 2021 -
News ArticleSeven individuals face prosecution for alleged ill-treatment and wilful neglect of patients at a hospital for people with severe learning disabilities. The alleged offences took place at the psychiatric intensive care unit at Muckamore Abbey Hospital in County Antrim, Northern Ireland. Prosecution follows ongoing police inquiries A police investigation into claims of abuse at the hospital has been ongoing since 2018, following reports of inappropriate behaviour and alleged physical abuse of service users by staff. Read full story Source: Nursing Standard, 19 April 2021
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News Article
'Urgent action' over children's mental health care
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
A child was twice given double the "safe" dose of a rapid tranquilizer at a hospital run by a troubled NHS trust. The child was put at "significant risk of harm" at Telford's Princess Royal Hospital, said inspectors. Rating children's services inadequate, they said Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) must halt seeing under 18s for acute mental health needs. The trust, in special measures, was working to "urgently address concerns". The Care Quality Commission (CQC) carried out a targeted inspection on 24 February prompted by "concerning information" about treatment at the service run by SaTH. The trust is currently at the centre of the largest ever inquiry into NHS maternity care. Staff told inspectors they had seen an increase in the number of young people with "significant mental health issues" and learning disabilities over the past year. But the services, which were rated as "requiring improvement" in November 2019, were deemed "inadequate" in four of five areas tested - for being safe, effective, responsive and well-led. Read full story Source: BBC News. 19 April 2021 -
News Article
Review into series of ‘unexpected deaths’ identifies service shortcomings
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
A review sparked by the ‘unexpected’ deaths of 13 patients has found several shortcomings in the talking therapy services offered by a mental health trust. The internal review at Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys Foundation Trust followed a series of deaths between October 2019 and September 2020. The trust has said the key findings included a lack of family involvement in discussing risks, increased waiting times for face-to-face therapy, and a lack of contact or reassessment for patients on waiting lists. Eight of the 13 deaths, six of which were suicides, were escalated to serious incident reviews, according to a freedom of information response received by HSJ. However, when asked for the findings of the serious incident reviews, the trust said: “To break down the key issues and attribute any single one of them to an individual patient death would in itself lead to potentially identifying that person.” The trust’s improving access to psychological therapies service assessed 11,839 people between October 2019 and September 2020. It comes amid a series of separate investigations into concerns around the trust’s services. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 13 April 2021 -
News Article
Children bearing brunt of ‘terrifying’ coronavirus mental health crisis
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Britain is facing a “terrifying” mental health crisis with tens of thousands more children needing specialist help since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Experts from the Royal College of Psychiatrists have warned the problem facing the country will get worse before it gets better with new analysis revealing almost 400,000 children and 2.2 million adults sought help for mental health problems during the crisis. While the effect of lockdown and coronavirus has affected people of all ages, children appear to be particularly susceptible. Some 80,226 more children and young people were referred to specialist mental health services between April and December last year, up by 28% on the same months in 2019 to 372,438. Dr Bernadka Dubicka, chairwoman of the child and adolescent faculty at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: "Our children and young people are bearing the brunt of the mental health crisis caused by the pandemic and are at risk of lifelong mental illness." "As a frontline psychiatrist I've seen the devastating effect that school closures, disrupted friendships and the uncertainty caused by the pandemic have had on the mental health of our children and young people." Read full story Source: 9 April, 2021 -
News ArticleWith the latest UK government figures showing that there have been nearly 150,000 deaths where COVID-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, it’s understandable why some people compare the pandemic with a war. Indeed, daily life in the NHS is now peppered with military language: the frontline, gold command calls, redeployment, buddy systems and 'moral injury' Moral injury can be defined as the distress that arises in response to actions or inactions that violate our moral code, our set of individual beliefs about what is right or wrong. In the medical literature, moral injury has historically been associated with the mental health needs of military personnel, arising from their traumatic experiences during active service. Moral injury is generally thought to arise in high-stakes situations so it’s no surprise that the term has gained traction in healthcare settings over the course of the pandemic, given that healthcare staff have been faced with extreme and sustained pressure at work. In many ways, working in the NHS over the past year has felt like being some sort of circus acrobat, contorting ourselves to balance various competing realities: the desire to provide high-quality care for all our patients in the context of limited resources, looking after our own health needs alongside those of our patients, trying to make peace with the responsibility we feel towards our loved ones while still upholding our duty of care to patients. If we fail to deliver, particularly in high-stakes situations where we think things should have been done differently, it can shake us to our core. Our moral code transcends the relatively superficial responsibilities of our professional role: it gets to the heart of who we are as human beings. If we feel like our core values have been attacked, it can leave us feeling devastated and disillusioned. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 12 April 2021
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News Article
COVID-19 mental health support programme made free for all
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
SilverCloud, a digital mental health platform, has launched a new COVID-19 support programme – ‘Space from COVID-19’ – which it has made free and available to everyone in the UK over the age of 18 years, indefinitely. The company hopes to improve access to digital mental health services during the pandemic and beyond, to help shoulder some of the demand that now faces health services in the UK and across the globe. SilverCloud’s new programme brings together a suite of digital resources and support that will assist users in managing and improving their mental health and wellbeing, specifically in regard to the impact of COVID-19. Crucially, it removes potential barriers by being open to all, with or without a clinical referral, and is fee-free for everyone. Dr Lloyd Humphreys, Clinical Psychologist and Head of Europe for SilverCloud, told HTN: “For us, what is really important is to support people during this difficult time. Everyone is talking about the mental health impact of COVID-19, everyone is talking about the problem, but no-one is really offering a solution." Read full story Source: Health Tech Newspaper, 8 April 2021 -
News ArticleOne in three people who were severely ill with coronavirus were subsequently diagnosed with a neurological or psychiatric condition within six months of infection, a study has found. The observational research, which is the largest of its kind, used electronic health records of 236,379 patients mostly from the US and found 34% experienced mental health and neurological conditions afterwards. The most common being anxiety, with 17% of people developing this. Experts warned that healthcare systems need to be resourced to deal with patients affected by this, which could be “substantial” given the scale of the pandemic. They anticipate that the impact could be felt on health services for many years. Neurological diagnoses such as stroke and dementia were rarer, but not uncommon in those who had been seriously ill during infection. Of those who had been admitted to intensive care, 7% had a stroke and almost 2% were diagnosed with dementia. The study, which was published in the Lancet Psychiatry, found that these diagnoses were more common in COVID-19 patients than among those who had the flu or respiratory tract infections over the same time period. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 7 April 2021
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News ArticleMental health "hubs" for new, expectant or bereaved mothers are to be set up around England. The 26 sites, due to be opened by next April, will offer physical health checks and psychological therapy in one building. NHS England said these centres would provide treatment for about 6,000 new parents in the first year. Five years ago, 40% of areas in England had no dedicated maternal mental health services. Things have improved since then with some specialist services available in each of the 44 local NHS areas in England. But in the NHS's Long Term Plan, published in 2019, the health service pledged to offer more "evidence-based" support, including to partners and families through these hubs or "outreach clinics". The NHS hopes to offer services to people with moderate-to-severe difficulties, whereas earlier investment focused on the most acutely unwell mothers. These clinics will "integrate maternity, reproductive health and psychological therapy for women experiencing mental health difficulties directly arising from, or related to, the maternity experience," NHS England said. Read full story Source: 5 April 2021
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News ArticleCoronavirus tests for patients in mental health hospitals should be couriered to testing labs and prioritised for results to prevent patients being forced to self-isolate for longer than is necessary, according to new guidance. NHS England has told mental health hospitals they need to use dedicated couriers for urgent swabs and tests should be specifically labelled for mental health patients so they can be turned around faster. Health bosses are worried thousands of patients in mental health wards could deteriorate ifare forced to self-isolate in their rooms for longer periods. More than 14,000 patients were being detained in hospital under the Mental Health Act in January 2021, with patients needing to be tested on admission to wards and if they show symptoms. Read full story Source: The Independent, 30 March 2021
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News ArticleA 40-year-old mother of four took her own life at an NHSmental health unit after multiple opportunities were missed to keep her safe, an inquest has found, prompting her family to call for a public inquiry. Azra Parveen Hussain was allegedly the seventh in-patient in seven years to die by the same means while in the care of Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust (BSMHT). Despite this, an inquest at Birmingham and Solihull Coroner’s Court last week heard that the Trust had not installed door pressure sensor alarms, which could have potentially alerted staff to the fatal danger these patients faced. While BSMHT is now taking action to install pressure sensors at Mary Seacole House, where Hussain died on 6 May, Coroner Emma Brown noted a lack of national regulation or guidance on the risks presented by internal doors in patients’ bedrooms and is issuing a Prevention of Future Deaths report calling for this to be remedied across the country. Read full story Source: The Independent, 28 March 2021
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News ArticleWards at a trust facing an inquiry over the deaths of vulnerable patients have been downgraded to ‘inadequate’ over fresh patient safety concerns. The Care Quality Commission said five adult and intensive wards across three hospitals run by Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys (TEWV) Foundation Trust “did not manage patient safety incidents well”. It also criticised the trust’s leaders for failing to make sure staff knew how to assess patient risk. The watchdog rated the trust’s acute wards for adults of working age and psychiatric intensive care units as “inadequate” overall as well as for safety and leadership. The trust was also served a warning notice threatening more enforcement action if the patient safety issues are not urgently addressed. At the previous inspection in March 2020, the service was rated “good”. TEWV said it has taken “immediate action” to address the issues, including a rapid improvement event for staff and daily safety briefings, and will also spend £3.6m to recruit 80 more staff. The trust’s overall rating of “requires improvement” remains unchanged after this inspection. Brian Cranna, CQC’s head of hospital inspection for the North (mental health and community health services), said: “We found these five wards were providing a service where risks were not assessed effectively or managed well enough to keep people safe from harm." “Staff did not fully understand the complex risk assessment process and what was expected of them. The lack of robust documentation put people at direct risk of harm, as staff did not have access to the information they needed to provide safe care." Read full story (paywall) Source: HSJ, 26 March 2021
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News Article
CQC to expand inspection programme from April
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
More Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspections will take place from next month as pressures from COVID-19 continue to ease. Board papers published ahead of a meeting on Wednesday have revealed the CQC will return to inspecting and rating NHS trusts and independent healthcare services which are rated “inadequate” or “requires improvement”, alongside those where new risks have come to light. From April, the CQC also plans to carry out well-led inspections of NHS and private mental healthcare providers, and programmes of focused inspections on the safety of maternity departments and providers’ infection prevention processes. Focused inspections into emergency departments, which the CQC began in February, will continue. Inspections into GP services rated “requires improvement” and “inadequate” will also resume in April, focusing on safety, effectiveness and leadership. Finally, the papers said the watchdog would prioritise inspections of “high-risk” independent healthcare services, such as ambulances, cosmetic surgery or where closed cultures may exist. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 24 March 2021 -
News Article
Mental Health Matters: What the staff survey said about quality and safety
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
With the annual NHS Staff Survey recently published, expectation was that this year might look a little different, all things considered. For the mental health sector, the dial didn’t move massively on key questions. The sector still came out bottom for staff who agreed they’d be happy with the standard of care if a friend or family member needed it - otherwise called the “family and friends test”. Although the survey was not that revelatory this year, it is still a helpful barometer for trusts’ safety and quality culture. Sheffield Health and Social Care Foundation Trust comes out lowest on all of the main quality and safety-related questions. On the crucial family and friends question, just 47% of the trust’s staff agreed that would be happy with the standard of care. The trust has been one of the worst performers on the survey for a number of years but appears to have deteriorated further. Sheffield Health and Social Care FT also came out worst on the following key safety culture related questions: When errors, near misses or incidents are reported, my organisation takes action to ensure that they do not happen again I would feel secure raising concerns about unsafe clinical practice My organisation acts on concerns raised by patients/service users. The last two questions are a vital indicator of a trust’s approach to safety and quality. If staff do not feel secure to raise concerns, or if a trust does not act on patient concerns can it really address problems before they escalate? Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 12 March 2021 -
News ArticlePregnant women and new mothers are three times as likely to suffer from poor mental health in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new study. The report, carried out by a coalition of leading maternal mental health organisations, suggested before that the public health crisis up to 20% of women developed a mental illness during pregnancy or within the first year after having a baby. But in lockdown, 6 in 10 mothers had substantial concerns around their mental health, according to researchers who polled more than 5,000 pregnant women and parents. The study warned women were more likely to suffer from anxiety, depression, loneliness and suicidal thoughts during the COVID-19 crisis. The Maternal Mental Health Alliance is one of the organisations behind the research. Luciana Berger, a former Labour MP who is now chair of the group, said: “Today’s report should serve as an ear-splitting warning siren about the dangers to women’s maternal mental health and potential risks to the wellbeing of their babies." Read full story Source: The Independent, 16 March 2021
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News Article
CQC orders ‘significant improvements’ at trust criticised over deaths
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) has ordered ‘significant improvements’ from a mental health trust which has been criticised over the deaths of vulnerable patients. The watchdog has warned Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys Foundation Trust (TEWV FT) it has “serious concerns” about risk management processes at its inpatient wards following inspections of three of its hospitals in January. It follows a string of severe problems in child and adolescent services run by the trust. In a formal letter and a separate warning notice to TEWV FT, the CQC ordered the trust to carry out “significant improvements” to the safety of adult acute wards, and psychiatric intensive care, after a visit to Roseberry Park, West Park and Cross Lane hospitals on the week of 18 January. Sources have told HSJ the trust’s leadership is working towards a May deadline to make sufficient improvements or it could potentially risk further enforcement action. However, neither the trust nor the CQC have confirmed this. Families and campaigners — including Labour MP Andy McDonald, who represents Middlesbrough — have called for a public inquiry into alleged “systematic failures” at the trust following the deaths of around 14 patients under the trust’s care within two years. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 12 March 2021 -
News Article
Jeremy Hunt’s safety programme has stalled, say bereaved families
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Bereaved families have been left feeling like their efforts to improve patient safety have been ‘in vain’ as progress of a government programme instigated by Jeremy Hunt appears to have ‘stalled’. The Learning from Deaths programme board, which was set up in 2017 to develop guidance for trusts working with families on investigations of deaths, has not met since June 2019. Josephine Ocloo and David Smith, two bereaved family members who were on the board, have written to HSJ, saying the programme’s progress has “stalled”. They added many of the issues it was set up to consider have not yet been addressed, including the need for a national inquiry into unresolved historical cases, the independence of the NHS’ investigatory systems, lack of effectiveness of the duty of candour, and the disproportionate impact on ethnic minorities and those with mental ill-health or learning disabilities. They said: “We now have serious concerns that what these families went through [in November 2017] in recalling — and effectively reliving — their experiences, in order to ensure the terrible things that happened to them could not happen to others, was in vain… “If [the issues] are not to be addressed by the new board, the families will have every right to feel betrayed and to feel as if they have been used as pawns in a political game. Once again, harmed and let down by a system that has used us and then cast us aside.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 26 February 2021 -
News Article
Key NHS long-term plan target to be missed ‘due to covid’
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The NHS is set to miss a major national target to eliminate inappropriate out of area placements within mental health by the end of March, HSJ can reveal. At least eight of the 52 English NHS mental health trusts surveyed by HSJ are predicting they will miss the national deadline of getting rid of their inappropriate OAPs by the end of next month. The national target was one of the headline mental health pledges set out in 2014’s Five Year Forward View. The pledge was also in 2019’s long-term plan. Inappropriate OAPs refer to people being sent out of their region to an inpatient mental health bed if no beds are available within their area. Patients are regularly sent hundreds of miles away from their homes. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 23 February 2021 -
News Article
NHS sets up mental health hubs for staff traumatised by Covid
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The NHS is setting up dozens of mental health hubs to help staff who have been left traumatised by treating Covid patients during the pandemic. There is mounting concern that large numbers of frontline workers have experienced mental health problems such as anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder over the last year. NHS personnel will be able to ring one of the 40 new hubs in England, receive advice and be referred for support from psychologists, mental health nurses, therapists and recovery workers. Frontline workers who are struggling with their mental health will be encouraged to use the service, and hub staff will call workers deemed at highest risk directly to offer their help. Higher-risk groups are likely to include those who work in intensive care, on Covid wards and in A&E units. Almost half of doctors, nurses and other ICU staff have reported symptoms of PTSD, severe depression or anxiety, according to research published last month. Of these, about 40% had probable PTSD – far higher than the rates seen among military veterans. Sir Simon Stevens, NHS England’s chief executive, announced the hubs in an interview with the House magazine. They are being set up at locations across England including Bedfordshire, Lancashire and north-east London. A handful are already in operation. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 22 February 2021 -
News ArticleAvailability of inpatient child and adolescent mental health services beds — particularly for eating disorders — has reached ‘crisis point’, with young people left waiting on a standard paediatric ward or at home as demand surged during the covid pandemic. A report to Surrey Heartlands Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) in January read: “Availability of tier four beds [inpatient mental health beds for children and adolescents, commissioned centrally by NHS England] in the South East and across the country is at crisis point and providers have to compete for the small pool of beds." “Waits for beds or being placed far from home is a distressing and unacceptable experience for children and young people and families and places an additional burden on other parts of the system such as paediatric wards.” The report noted a “demand upsurge to the highest levels in the last three years” since the pandemic. It stated, in mid-January, the CCG had two patients awaiting eating disorder beds being managed on paediatric wards as they had become “physically too unwell to be managed at home”. Four others also waiting for a CAMHS bed were being managed at home. Read full story Source: 16 February 2021
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News Article
A third of Covid patients put on ventilator report PTSD symptoms
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
One in three Covid patients put on a ventilator experience extensive symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), according to research, which adds to mounting evidence of the virus’s impact on mental health. The study of 13,049 patients with confirmed or suspected coronavirus, by Imperial College London and the University of Southampton, found that one in five who were admitted to hospital but did not require a ventilator also experienced extensive symptoms of PTSD. The most common PTSD symptom experienced by COVID-19 patients was intrusive images, sometimes known as flashbacks. Examples of these could be images of the intensive care unit (ICU) environment, ICU doctors wearing full personal protective equipment or other patients in the ICU. The study, published in the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ BJPsych Open, on Tuesday, found lower levels of extensive symptoms of PTSD for patients given medical help at home (approximately one in six) and patients who required no help at home but experienced breathing problems (one in ten). Dr Adam Hampshire, from Imperial College London, said: “We can see that the pandemic is likely to be having an acute and lasting impact, including for a significant proportion of patients who remained at home with respiratory problems and received no medical help. This evidence could be important for informing future therapy and reducing the long-term health burden of this disease.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 9 February 2021 -
News ArticleToronto, Canada, will launch a pilot programme that will see civilians, not police officers, dispatched to 911 calls involving mental health crises — as long as violence is not being threatened. Council also approved a motion by Mayor John Tory to fast-track parts of the plan and review 911 call services in 2021 to determine how best to dispatch help through the proposed new service. The plan calls for four crisis support teams in different parts of the city, to respond to some of the roughly 30,000 calls for people in crisis that go through 911 each year. Pilot programmes are to be launched in early 2022, and were scheduled to be fully implemented in 2026 if proven successful. Tory’s motion called for full implementation by 2025. “Putting something else in place is not a simple task. It is necessary that we do it properly,” said Tory, in bringing forward the motion. Nonetheless, the mayor said, he believes it can be done more quickly. Asante Haughton, a mental health advocate and co-founder of the Reach Out Response Network, focused on transformational change in mental-health crisis response, said the move is another rung on the ladder to a more equitable society. “I really see this as an opportunity to transform the way that we think about mental health and transform the way that we think about social service and community building in general,” he said. Read full story Source: Toronto Star, 2 February 2021
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News Article
Doctor: We're getting self-harming 10-year-olds in A&E
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The pandemic has had a deep impact on children, who are arriving in A&E in greater numbers and at younger ages after self-harming or taking overdoses, writes Dr John Wright of Bradford Royal Infirmary. Children are a lost tribe in the pandemic. While they remain (for the most part) perplexingly immune to the health consequences of COVID-19, their lives and daily routines have been turned upside down. From surveys and interviews carried out for the Born in Bradford study, we know that they are anxious, isolated and bored, and we see the tip of this iceberg of mental ill health in the hospital. Children in mental health crisis used to be brought to A&E about twice a week. Since the summer it's been more like once or twice a day. Some as young as 10 have cut themselves, taken overdoses, or tried to asphyxiate themselves. There was even one child aged eight. Lockdown "massively exacerbates any pre-existing mental health issues - fears, anxieties, feelings of disconnection and isolation," says A&E consultant Dave Greenhorn. Read full story Source: BBC News, 2 February 2021 -
News Article
NHS drops virtual assessments used to section patients
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Hospital trusts in England have been told to stop using virtual assessments to section people under the Mental Health Act after a judge ruled them unlawful. An NHS trust sought a court judgment on remote assessments after the Department of Health and Social Care issued guidance in November indicating that this method could be used as part of an evaluation during the pandemic. Experts said that a “small but significant” number of people may have been sectioned this way. Following the judgment, an email was sent to mental health professionals from NHS England saying “immediate action required”. It added that anyone detained via remote assessment would need to be notified. The message read: “Stop using remote methods for any new or ongoing assessments for detention or section renewals under Part II of the Act.” “All mental health providers should identify and reassess individuals who are currently detained under Part II of the MHA following a remote assessment as soon as possible if ongoing detention is deemed necessary.” The government had originally advised that it believed remote assessment could be used but said only the courts could provide a definitive interpretation of the law, setting out the circumstances under which such assessments could take place. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 30 January 2021 -
News Article
Children's mental health services in England 'unable to meet demand'
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Mental health services in England do not have the capacity to cope with the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on children, Anne Longfield, the children’s commissioner for England, has warned. Despite an expansion in the four years before the pandemic, the supply of treatment for child mental health problems was already falling well short of demand, with referrals rising 35%, but treatments only increasing by 4%, the watchdog said as she called for a “rocket boost” in funding. Longfield cited an NHS study before the latest national lockdown, which found one in six children had a probable mental health condition and said it is highly likely that the level of underlying mental health problems will remain significantly higher as a result of the pandemic, with an increase in referrals to NHS services already observed last autumn. “Even before the Covid pandemic, we faced an epidemic of children’s mental health problems in England and a children’s mental health service that, though improving significantly, was still unable to provide the help hundreds of thousands of children required,” Longfield said. “It is widely accepted that lockdown and school closures have had a detrimental effect on the mental health of many children.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 28 January 2021
