19.06.13
Mental health hospital admittance twice as high
Mental health service users have almost twice the attendance rate of the general population, new figures from the Health and Social Care Information Centre (HSCIC) show.
Four in ten service users visited A&E at least once in 2011/12 compared to two in ten of the general population. Almost 40% were admitted to hospital at least once and 67.1% had at least one outpatient appointment, compared to 16.5% and 38.4% respectively.
HSCIC chair Kingsley Manning said: “Today’s report, which shows a large difference in the use of hospital departments by mental health service users compared to the general population, illustrates the power of data linkage.
“By providing this type of information, which was never before available, we can help health professionals see what is happening across health and social care and begin to explore what lies behind these facts and figures. This in turn will support improved treatments and outcomes and drive better care for patients and the public.”
Simon Lawton-Smith, head of policy at the Mental Health Foundation, said: “This analysis highlights with real clarity the pressure that mental health service users put on hard-pressed A&E and hospital services, and the need to do much more to support people in primary care and in the community, so that individual patients require A&E and inpatient care much less often.
“Given the NHS spends more on secondary mental health care than either heart disease or cancer, this has to be top of Clinical Commissioning Groups’ priorities, both from an economic and clinical point of view.
“There’s also a strong message in this data about all A&E staff being trained to identify and respond quickly to mental health issues, including rapid referral to expert assessment and treatment through A&E liaison psychiatry teams. These teams have been shown to reduce response times to patients in distress as well as reducing the number of serious incidents and the number of times people attend A&E.”
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