12.11.12
‘Parity of esteem’ for mental health waiting times
Patients with mental health issues can expect the same waiting times as those with physical illnesses, health minister Norman Lamb is set to announce.
The initiative will be officially announced on Tuesday November 13 as part of the mandate for the NHS Commissioning Board.
In June, research by the London School of Economics found that individuals suffering from depression or anxiety could wait up to six months for treatment. However, individuals with physical illnesses would typically wait for up to three weeks.
Under the new scheme, both mental and physical illness will be treated under the same 18 week waiting time target. The mentally ill will also receive personal care plans, in order to further address the imbalance between physical and mental illnesses.
Spending on mental health has dropped for the first time in a decade, Lamb highlighted, by 1% to £6.63bn in August 2012. Mental health accounts for 23% of illness in the NHS but only 13% of NHS funding is spent on mental health issues.
Lamb told the Guardian: “Mental health has been excluded from major health policies, such as waiting-times standards, and people have suffered as a consequence. I am determined to end this institutional bias that exists in the health service.”
A specific waiting-time target will not be set, but Lamb added: “Let's start collecting the data so we can understand the scale of the problem, address unacceptable delays and then move towards establishing proper standards to significantly improve access and waiting times for all mental health services.
“We will be asking the NHS to demonstrate real and meaningful progress towards achieving true 'parity of esteem' between mental health and physical care by March 2015.”
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