2nd Day of Lent: Going without adequate resources, reliable appointments or reasonable waiting times

Ipswich Town FC

Footyfan says:

“When is this NHS Trust going to realise that whilst community-based care and treatment is great and looks to be the way forward, they must provide adequate resources for it to work? As a family that accesses this service I have to say the organisation of it is terrible; we worked out the other day that out of somewhere in the region of 14 appointments since Christmas Eve, staff from this Trust were only able to actually attend less than 50%. Reasons given were high levels of sickness, conflicts in appointment diaries, having to cover other duties, attending meetings, etc. to name a few. Staff are constantly apologising, they seem to have very low morale and I know for a fact feel less than informed as to what is happening within certain areas. I have heard one staff member say that when phoning head office for advice support the head office didn’t even know of their units existence!! If the staff don’t know what services their organisation runs and provides what hope is there for the community? The referral system is a joke – referrals that are intended to be dealt with within 28 days can take almost 3 months.”

Whether you use mental health services, are a carer or member of the staff, let us know your stories: we’re stronger together.

1 thought on “2nd Day of Lent: Going without adequate resources, reliable appointments or reasonable waiting times”

  1. Still going without beds for urgent admissions. This week two patients spent all day waiting for a bed to be found; one patient spent from 9am until 10pm detained in a Section136 Place of Safety suite while the bed management team trawled the country begging private hospitals to accept our patients; no bed could be found and in the end authorisation had to be given to use a ‘red leave’ bed ( a red leave bed is a bed for a patient who is on trial leave from the hospital and whose risks are such that if they need to be readmitted their bed should be immediately available!While a bed was sought two police officers were constantly tied up in the Place of Safety suite and therefore not available to police Norfolk; also tied up were two AMHPs and doctors who could not complete section papers until a hospital could be identified; worst of all is the distress caused to the patient who knows he will be admitted to hospital but has no idea where this might be – Norwich, Ipswich, Chelmsford, London, Harrogate, Dorking, Hastings, Weston, Bradford….Who knows? And who knows what standard of care is being provided in these hospitals. Not NSFT certainly.

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