The NHS is badly letting down vulnerable patients with mental health problems.
That’s the view of health service ombudsman Rob Behrens.
Behrens says the NHS’s shortcomings mean families endure “needless suffering and distress”.
Health service ombudsman Rob Behrens: his report reveals how the NHS lets down mental health patients
Lack of capacity, skills and training
The ombudsman has found NHS mental health staff can lack the capacity, skills and training to work effectively.
And he warned they do not always get the support they need to learn from mistakes.
Behrens has published a report, titled Maintaining momentum: driving improvements in mental health care.
He based it on more than 200 complaints made by, or on behalf of, people with mental ill health.
The complaints were upheld or partly upheld between April 2014 and October 2017.
Five common failings
Behrens highlights five common failings. These include failing to diagnose and treat, inappropriate discharge and aftercare, and poor risk assessments.
He also highlighted failing to treat patients with dignity or infringing human rights, as well as poor communication with patients, families and carers.
One investigation found a woman had a life-threatening reaction after staff treated her with antipsychotics for a psychotic episode.
They dismissed her symptoms and she died.
And a man with a history of mental health problems died from an overdose after staff discharged him from a mental health service without a care plan.
Vulnerable people treated without dignity
Behrens said too many vulnerable patients are treated without“dignity and respect”. This, he added, is “compounded by poor complaint handling”.
Brian Dow is Rethink Mental Illness’s director of external affairs. He said the findings “underline the desperate need for reform”.
An NHS England spokesperson said “every part of the mental health service” should read and act on the report.
The spokesperson added that NHS services are to expand. This would bring “increased access, closer to home, to earlier and more effective treatment for greater numbers of people than ever before”.
Related:
- Four in five suffer poor mental health
- Still stuck in mental health hospitals
- Mental health problems go undiagnosed
- Scandal of child mental health spending
Published: 26 March 2018
