Beds Crisis: How NSFT managers have designed bureaucratic obstacles to prevent or delay mental health admissions

23 Comments / Bed Crisis, Campaigning, CQC Inspection, Crisis Team Crisis, Dangerous, Deaths Crisis, In NSFT's words, Knowing me, knowing you, aha!, Meltdown, NSFT Cuts, Questions for the Board, s136 Crisis, Special Measures / By

It has long been clear that Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) tries to manipulate its inappropriate out of area placement (OAP) bed statistics when the Care Quality Commission (CQC) comes to inspect. As the graph below shows, out of area bed usage was again artificially reduced in the run-up to the latest full […]

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EDP: Young people face five month waiting lists for mental health support

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Jessica Frank-Keyes of the Eastern Daily Press reports: Children and young people with mental health issues are waiting up to five months for treatment in parts of Norfolk and Suffolk. Adolescents with mental health conditions in Great Yarmouth and Waveney are facing waiting lists for mental health support ranging from a week to access urgent

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EDP: Improving figures, but mental health campaigners say more needs to be done or ‘expect more deaths’

5 Comments / Bed Crisis, Car Crash, Community Crisis, CQC Inspection, Crisis Team Crisis, Dangerous, Deaths Crisis, Kept in the dark, Knowing me, knowing you, aha!, Meltdown, NSFT Cuts, Press, Questions for the Board, Radical Restructure, Recruitment Crisis, Revolving Doors, s136 Crisis / By

Donna-Louise Bishop of the Eastern Daily Press reports: Campaigners for better mental health provisions say more needs to be done to protect the regions’s most vulnerable patients from being sent hundreds of miles away for treatment. It comes following a meeting of the board of directors for Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT), in

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Beds Crisis: Chief Operating Officer Stuart Richardson’s paper to the Board vs The Truth in a Graph

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This is Stuart Richardson’s paper on the beds crisis and the transportation of people which he is presenting as Chief Operating Officer of Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) to the Board of NSFT tomorrow. Compare Richardson’s paper with the graph of NSFT’s actual performance below. The reasons for the meltdown of mental health

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Campaign opinion: First Anniversary: Stuart Richardson, Chief Operating Officer, NSFT

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Stuart Richardson was appointed as Chief Operating Officer of Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) under the leadership of former Chief Executive, Antek Lejk and former Chair, Gary Page and started his job on 1st August 2018. One year ago today. Managing beds is his responsibility. In the six months immediately before Stuart Richardson

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EDP: Revealed: How mental health patients are being sent to failing private hospital

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Geraldine Scott of the Eastern Daily Press reports: Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust (NSFT) sent 21 patients to Kneesworth House, in Royston, over the last year and on Tuesday it was revealed how Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspectors found dirty wards and “uncaring and disrespectful” staff at Hertfordshire unit, as well as Priory Hospital Blandford

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EDP: ‘The system is broken’ – emergency mental health 999 incidents double

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Dominic Gilbert of the Eastern Daily Press reports: Urgent mental health-related incidents attended by police officers have almost doubled in four years as pressures on the 999 service grow. Coinciding with the ‘radical redesign’ and ruthless cuts to mental health community, crisis and home treatment teams and beds; the closure of assertive outreach and homeless

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BBC News: Mental health trust’s out-of-area placements hit record levels

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The BBC reports: A troubled mental health trust is sending record numbers of people far from home for treatment, figures show. Some Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust patients are being cared for hundreds of miles away because local beds are unavailable. The number of bed days for out-of-area placements in April 2019 was 1,911,

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Audio: BBC Radio Norfolk: Campaign spokesperson interviewed by Nick Conrad about Beds Crisis and Mental Health Meltdown at NSFT

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For those who missed this interview on BBC Radio Norfolk, you can now listen by clicking on the audio bar below:

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Press Release: Campaign statement on the delays to the cuts café

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A spokesperson from the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk and Suffolk said: “People in crisis need real services, not being patronised with cups of tea and endless signposting to long waiting lists or non-existent services. There are already drop-in centres, cafés and NHS services but their funding is deeply inadequate and has

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EDP: Mental health crisis hub delayed by a year as patients continue to be sent hundreds of miles for treatment

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Geraldine Scott of the Eastern Daily Press reports: A crisis hub pegged to help stem the number of mental health patients sent miles away due to a lack of beds has been delayed by a year in part due to debates over the building it will be in. A wellbeing hub – also known as

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EDP: Mental health service failure “significantly contributed” to suicide of Norwich mother

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Dominic Gilbert of the Eastern Daily Press reports: Failures of mental health services “significantly contributed” to the suicide of a mother struggling with depression and post-traumatic stress disorder, a jury has found. Katherine Rought-Rought died at her home in North Park Avenue in Norwich on June 1, 2016 from asphyxiation due to strangulation. Only hours

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EDP: Consultant psychiatrist says Norwich mother should have been admitted to hospital before her death

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Geraldine Scott of the Eastern Daily Press reports: A consultant psychiatrist said the set up of mental health services across the country was “terrible” at an inquest into the death of a Norwich mother. Dr Robert Higgo, an expert clinical psychiatrist, gave evidence at Norfolk Coroner’s Court in Norwich this morning, into the death of

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Beds not Tea: Cuts Café Consultation: Last chance to respond

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The bureaucrats who commission NHS mental health services in Norfolk have decided to run their consultation into the proposed cuts café over the Christmas and New Year holiday period, thus ensuring as few people as possible respond. Commissioners tried to do a back-door deal to give a ‘pilot’ cuts café contract to Norfolk Mind without

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EDP: Patients rate Norfolk and Suffolk mental health trust as one of worst in country

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Tom Bristow of the Eastern Daily Press reports: The region’s mental health service has been named as one of the worst performing in the country in a survey of patients. Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust, which was brought out of “special measures” in October, was rated particularly badly for supporting people with mental health difficulties

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EDP: Letter: Reasons for rise in unexpected deaths need to be established

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In an excellent letter to the Eastern Daily Press, Brian Watkins, Liberal Democrat county councillor for the Eaton Division of Norfolk County Council writes: It is deeply disturbing to learn that there has been a big increase in the number of patients under the care of the Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust who have died unexpectedly. Despite repeated reassurances that the situation would be

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EDP Front Page Exclusive: Number of deaths at Norfolk and Suffolk mental health service surges

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Nick Carding of the EDP reports exclusively: Campaigners say their “worst fears have been confirmed” after it emerged that the number of unexpected deaths of mental health patients in the region is continuing to rise. Figures published by the region’s mental health trust show more patients died unexpectedly in the first half of this financial

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BBC News: Mental health death after Norfolk and Suffolk trust failure

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Nic Rigby of the BBC reports: A mental health patient died after a “failure” to respond in a “timely way” by a stretched health trust team, a report says. The Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust report said there were “serious capacity issues” with its crisis resolution team. It says another death occurred after a patient

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Kept in the Dark: Artist’s Impression of chart showing increasing unexpected deaths among those who rely on NSFT

3 Comments / Community Crisis, Crisis Team Crisis, Dangerous, Kept in the dark, NSFT Cuts, Questions for the Board / By

We challenged Gary Page, the Chair of Norfolk and Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT), to publish NSFT’s data on unexpected deaths after his report to the NSFT Board stated he was “concerned” at the increase in unexpected community deaths from 95 in 2013-14 to 130 in 2014-15. On the same day Gary Page refused to publish,

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Gallery: Slides from Public Meeting: What is happening at NSFT? Do we still need a campaign?

3 Comments / Anniversary Open Meeting, Bed Crisis, CAMHS Crisis, Campaigning, Community Crisis, Crisis Team Crisis, Dangerous, Financial crisis, In NSFT's words, Kept in the dark, NSFT Cuts, Questions for the Board, Section 75, Special Measures / By

You can view the presentation in the Gallery below or download the slides as a pdf to view offline, distribute or print.   The sources of the employment data are the various Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) Annual Report and Accounts published between 2011 and 2015. The sources of the Serious Incident (SI)

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