Search the hub
Showing results for tags 'Self harm/ suicide'.
Found 206 results
-
Content Article
Prevention of Future Deaths report – Azra Hussain
Mark Hughes posted an article in Coroner reports
Azra Hussain died by suicide while a patient at Mary Seacole House, operated and staffed by Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health Foundation Trust. In their report, the Coroner raised patient safety concerns relating to her family being unable to participate in a multidisciplinary team meeting prior to her death due to Covid-19 visiting restrictions. -
News ArticleSelf-harm among the over-65s must receive greater focus because of the increased risks associated with the pandemic, a leading expert has said. Loneliness, bereavement and reluctance to access GPs can all be causes in older adults, said Prof Nav Kapur, who has produced guidelines on the subject. He warned that in over-65s, without the right help, self-harm can also be a predictor of later suicide attempts. The NHS's mental health director said it had expanded its community support. Claire Murdoch added that its services, including face-to-face appointments, had "continued for all who needed them", and 24/7 crisis lines had been established. Over-65s are hospitalised more than 5,000 times a year in England because of self-harm and self-poisoning, figures obtained from NHS Digital show. Read full story Source: BBC News, 3 June 2021
-
News ArticleResearch has found that people who go to A&E following self-harm receive varying quality of care and this has a significant impact on what they experience subsequently. The study in BMJ Open, which was codesigned and co-authored with people who have lived experience of self-harm and mental health services, found negative experiences were common, and revealed stigmatising comments about injuries from some hospital staff. Some participants reported being refused medical care or an anaesthetic because they had harmed themselves. This had a direct impact on their risk of repeat self-harm and suicide risk, as well as their general mental health. According to the research, the participants who received supportive assessments with healthcare staff reported feeling better, less suicidal and were less likely to repeat self- harm. "This research highlights the importance of learning from the experiences of individuals to help improve care for people who have harmed themselves. We involved patients and carers throughout the entire process and this enabled us to gain a greater insight into what patients want after they present to hospital having harmed themselves", said Dr Leah Quinlivan. Read full story Source: University of Manchester, 25 May 2021
-
Content ArticleThe Suicide Prevention National Transformation Programme aims to reduce the number of deaths by suicide in England by 10% by 2020/21. NHS England are investing funding in 37 local areas to establish or develop their multi-agency suicide prevention action plans to reduce suicide and self-harm. These plans cover three of the main priority areas identified in the National Suicide Prevention Strategy: Reducing risk in men. Prevention and response to self-harm. Improving acute mental health care. Find out more about the programme and useful resources from the link below.
-
Content ArticleAngie Middleton, Patient Safety Lead for Mental Health (London Region), presents on the Mental Health Suicide Report and discusses London's incident reporting. She highlights that we need to understand whether the extent to which the increase in reported incidents is as a result of more consistent reporting, or an actual increase in actual incidents or as a result of an increase in the number of patients accessing secondary mental health services. She asks whether there is a way of collectively getting timely, consistent and accurate data for multiagency use, and how we can collectively reduce suicides by 10% by 2020/21.
-
Content Article
Samaritans: Our work in prisons
PatientSafetyLearning Team posted an article in Prison setting
People in prison are significantly more likely to die by suicide. Samaritans work with prison services to reduce suicide and self-harm in prisons. Follow the link below to find out how people in prison, and prison staff, can access Samaritans' services. -
EventuntilWe have known for several years that nurses are at higher risk of suicide than the general population and that nurses have more job-related problems recorded prior to death by suicide. What we have now learned about those job-related problems is troublesome at best with implications for risk managers, hospital executives, and all leaders in healthcare. The panel in the Patient Safety Association webinar will describe the issues and implications for advocacy and policy change necessary to right the wrongs leading to death by suicide amongst nurses through personal testimony and review of recent research findings. This webinar is sponsored by CHPSO. By the end of the session, the participants will be able to: Identify major issues stemming from the workplace that lead to death by suicide. Identify institutional, professional, and individual actions that can be taken to reduce risk. Describe the flaws in the current system that prevent accurately tracking and action-planning to reduce risks amongst nurses. Register
-
Content Article
Supporting someone with suicidal thoughts
PatientSafetyLearning Team posted an article in Suicide and self-harm
If you think someone is in immediate danger, the quickest way to get help is to call an ambulance on 999. -
Content ArticleThis course, run by Samaritans, will benefit anyone whose role brings them into contact with vulnerable customers or colleagues. Conversations with vulnerable people will equip you with the skills and confidence to handle challenging conversations in a sensitive and professional way.
-
Content Article
StopSIM: Mental health is not a crime (21 April 2021)
Patient Safety Learning posted an article in Mental health
StopSIM is a coalition of mental health service users and allies who have grave concerns about the rapid, widespread rollout of the High Intensity Network’s ‘Serenity Integrated Mentoring’ (SIM) intervention across NHS England. The intervention is designed for people who have not committed a crime, but are in contact with mental health services, are frequently at high risk of suicide and self harm and are deemed “high intensity users” of emergency services. Key intervention components include a co-ordinated withholding of potentially life saving treatment by multiple agencies (A&E, mental health, ambulance and police services) and, using SIM’s own words, the “coercive” approach of a police officer as an interventionist.- Posted
- 2 comments
-
1
-
- (and 2 more)
-
News Article
Trust ‘reviewing hundreds of patients’ after failings discovered
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The suicide of a woman with severe mental illness has prompted a review into the care of hundreds of other patients, according to her family. Frances Wellburn, 56, was under the care of Tees, Esk and Wear Valley Foundation Trust’s community mental health team in York, which before the coronavirus pandemic had categorised her as “medium risk”. This meant she should have had regular contact from the service, but an internal serious incident report into her death, seen by HSJ, found no contact was made with her for three months. In June 2020 she required admission to an inpatient unit for three weeks, but she deteriorated again after being discharged and took her own life in August. Her family have said Ms Wellburn was making a “good recovery” from episodes of psychosis prior to the pandemic, but the lack of support in the spring of last year had contributed to a major deterioration in her condition. According to sister, Rebecca Wellburn, the trust’s director of nursing Elizabeth Moody confirmed in a meeting with the family that a wider review had now been launched into the care of hundreds of patients under its York-based community services. Read full story Source: HSJ, 28 April 2021 -
Content ArticleSerenity Integrated Mentoring (SIM) is a new program being introduced in London aimed at improving coping mechanisms and reducing emergency service use in High Intensity Service Users (HISUs). In this feasibility study, Anokhina et al. an evaluation of SIM effectiveness was assessed using demographic data. Three SIM boroughs (Greenwich, Camden and Islington) were compared with a non-SIM borough (Enfield) on emergency service use and costs in the 12 months prior to SIM and 9 months after. Qualitative interviews were conducted with SIM practitioners and service users. They found hat service users did attend A&E less, and were being arrested less, but this was true for both SIM and non-SIM participants. The economic analysis also showed that, at this stage, we cannot see any cost savings to service use yet. These results are something we expected because of the small scale of the study. However, we found that the quality of the data that is recorded by emergency services would allow us to carry out a full-scale study which would give us clearer answers
-
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 -
Content ArticleFor some time now I've been looking to find out more about mental health services in Trieste, Italy. Then I met Vincenzo Passante Spaccapietra, co-host of the Place of Safety? podcast series. This has enabled me to learn more about the closure of the mental institutions in Trieste, Italy, and the work of Franco Basaglia. I was keen to find out what really took place, what this really means in practice and how we can adopt this model in the UK. We were delighted to have become involved and to have recorded a couple of podcasts. I recommend this resource to everyone interested in safe, compassionate, patient led mental health care.
-
Content ArticleThis government report, the fifth of its kind, explores suicide prevention, setting out the data and evidence, together with the personal stories and experiences that guide us. It sets out progress against existing commitments, and sets new commitments and priorities
-
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
-
Event
'DO NO HARM' documentary screening
Patient Safety Learning posted an event in Community Calendar
untilA screening of 'DO NO HARM', a 60-minute documentary that discusses physician burnout and suicide followed by a 60-minute panel discussion. Doctors take an oath to save lives, yet they are taking their own at an alarming rate, trapped in a toxic healthcare system that puts their patients' lives at risk. This film and panel discussion bring awareness to the topic of this epidemic that's been covered up for decades until now. Register -
News Article
Suicide inquest sparks warning on 'nine month wait' for treatment
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
The government has been called on to take action over the national “backlog” for a specialist mental health service after a woman died after a substantial wait to access treatment. Carole Mitchell, who died by suicide on 22 November 2019, waited almost seven months for a first appointment after being referred to Greater Manchester Mental Health Foundation Trust for psychology services. In a prevention of future deaths report, published earlier this month, coroner Alison Mutch said the inquest was told waits had since increased and “someone in Mrs Mitchell’s position today would be more likely to wait nine months”. The coroner added evidence heard suggested the delay experienced was “reflective of both the regional and national backlog for appointments”. The report has been sent to both the Department of Health and Social Care and Greater Manchester Health and Social Care Partnership. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 1 March 2021 -
News ArticleAn average of 10 pre-teen children are admitted to hospital for self-harm each week, it has been revealed, in an apparent doubling of rates. Between 2019 and 2020 there were 508 recorded hospital admissions for self-injury, such as cutting oneself, within the 9-12 age group in the UK, compared to 221 between 2013 and 2014, suggesting rates have doubled in the past six years, according to an analysis of the data from BBC Radio 4’s File on 4 programme. “The increase in the data that you've looked at is in keeping with what we're finding from our research databases,” Keith Hawton CBE, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Oxford and consultant psychiatrist at Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust, told BBC File on 4. Prof Hawton, who is also principal investigator of the multicentre study of self-harm in England, said: “It's almost as though the problem is spreading down the age range somewhat. And I do think it is a concerning problem. And I do think it's important that it's recognised that self-harm can occur in relatively young children, which many people are surprised by." Read full story Source: The Independent, 16 February 2021
-
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 must review ‘all disciplinary procedures’ by March following nurse’s suicide
Patient Safety Learning posted a news article in News
Trusts have been urged to reflect on their disciplinary procedures, and review them annually where required, following the death of a senior nurse who took his own life after being dismissed. NHS England’s chief people officer Prerana Issar has written to trust leaders to highlight Imperial College Healthcare Trust’s new disciplinary procedures, which were put in place following Amin Abdullah’s suicide. Mr Abdullah, a senior nurse at Charing Cross Hospital in west London, was suspended in September 2015 before being let go from his job that December. He died in February 2016 after setting himself on fire. An independent investigation criticised both the trust and its staff and concluded he had been “treated unfairly”. The summary report produced by the trust was labelled a “whitewash”, which “served to reassure the trust that it had handled the case with due care and attention”, and the delay of three months between the events and hearing were “troubling”. The report, which also criticised the delays as “excessive” and “weak” in their justification, said Mr Abdullah found the delay “stressful” and caused him to become “distressed”. In the letter sent on Tuesday, seen by HSJ, Ms Issar said: “The shared learning from Amin’s experience has demonstrated the need for us to work continuously and collaboratively, to ensure that our people practices are inclusive, compassionate and person-centred, with an overriding objective as to the safety and wellbeing of our people… our collective goal is to ensure we enable a fair and compassionate culture in our NHS. I urge you to honestly reflect on your organisation’s disciplinary procedure…" Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 3 December 2020 -
Content ArticleRisk assessments are a central component of mental health care. Few national studies have been done in the UK on risk assessment tools used in mental health services. In this study, Graney et al. aimed to examine which suicide risk assessment tools are in use in the UK; establish the views of clinicians, carers, and service users on the use of these tools; and identify how risk assessment tools have been used with mental health patients before suicide.
-
Content ArticleThe purpose of the US Joint Commission's National Patient Safety Goals is to improve patient safety. The goals focus on problems in healthcare safety in the USA and how to solve them. They include identifying patients correctly, improving staff communication, use medicine safely, use alarms safely, prevent infection, identify patient safety risks and prevent mistakes in surgery.
-
Content ArticleMany risks faced by patients in acute mental health settings are similar to those that occur in other areas of healthcare, for example medication errors and cross-infection. In addition, however, there are unsafe behaviours associated with serious mental health problems, including violence and self-harm; the measures taken to address these, such as restraint or seclusion, may result in further risks to patient safety. This article by Catherine Gilliver in the Nursing Times discusses the need for a physical and psychosocial environment in which staff, patients and visitors feel recognised and valued.
-
Content ArticleWhen Giancarlo Gaglione’s brother, Lanfranco, died by suicide at the age of 26, it came like a lightning bolt out of the blue. None of his family or friends had noticed anything different about him leading up to the moment he took his own life, and he only confided briefly, a week before, in two people: his best friend and his girlfriend. In this article, the World Health Organization (WHO) focuses on how masculinity norms can discourage men from recognising and seeking help for mental health problems. A new Health Evidence Network (HEN) report on Mental health, men, and culture, launched by the WHO Regional Office for Europe, gives concrete recommendations on how policy-makers can address certain mental health issues arising from traditional patterns of masculinity.
