This morning, we're stepping our of our area and we're going to take a look to the other end of the country from the North West and the absolutely appalling situation in Norfolk and Suffolk.
Colchester Hospital declares a major incident and it makes headline news. 50 mental health patients are sent out of area in a week and it's only worthy of local news.
There are two article of interest on the BBC website on this story,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-30058920
Jeremy Hunt is quoted in the above article:- "In June Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt criticised the "unacceptable"
distances Norfolk and Suffolk Foundation Trust (NSFT) patients had to
travel for beds.
And yet, the DoH push ahead in their demand that the Trust cuts its budget by 40million.
Listen to the story from one of the Service users who was sent away from her home also quoted from the above article.
"No bed
could be found in Norfolk and Suffolk, so a bed was found for her at a
hospital in Nottingham.
She said: "A private ambulance came at 10 o'clock at night to
drive me to the hospital. My friends could not come and see me (because
of the distance). My husband could not come and see me. "In the end I discharged myself. I did not want to be so far away from home. "It made my recovery slower. It was detrimental to my health and my husband's."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-29936392
Their campaign group and their service users say the same as ours. That the cuts and the closure of beds is having a devastating effect on the people who need those services.
We know that feeling. We know that it is devastating and harmful.
We MUST stop dismissing these issues as too "local". Until we take a joined up look at what is happening to mental health services across the country, people will continue to be harmed.
The cuts to Mental Health funding and the closure of psychiatric beds
is endemic across the UK and hurting people with mental illness
everywhere. It has to change.
Showing posts with label early release. Show all posts
Showing posts with label early release. Show all posts
Saturday, 15 November 2014
Sunday, 9 November 2014
Away from family and early release - A husband speaks out
As we've said many times before, the closure of The Orchard to women doesn't just affect the women themselves. It affects their families and those around them. This email is from the husband of one service user from our area.
In 14 yrs of using of using mental health services this is the first time I've heard of any spare capacity in the female inpatient provision in Lancaster. It was always rare that a bed would be available for my wife when admission was needed, and a regular occurrence that home leave would lead to loss of a bed.
When my daughter was 3 years old we had to travel to Kendal hospital for about 6 weeks using public transport, that was difficult, costly and time consuming. Just recently my wife had to be admitted to Burnley due to Lancaster having no spare beds.
This resulted in poor care provision as the staff had no knowledge of her personality prior to illness or of the best way to deal with her. They then proceeded to discharge her before she had properly recovered causing extreme distress to our family who then had to cope with the aftermath of her actions.
All of this could have been avoided had local care with those who know her been available, and easy access for her family who have been very proactive in her care and recovery with daily input.
Let's just remind ourselves again that when Keith Dibble was asked "Do you accept that moving these women further away from their families and children could be damaging?" He replied "We believe not".
We are still telling you that it does. We have first hand experience that it does.
Start listening Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust. You are failing in your duty of care to us and we will not go away.
In 14 yrs of using of using mental health services this is the first time I've heard of any spare capacity in the female inpatient provision in Lancaster. It was always rare that a bed would be available for my wife when admission was needed, and a regular occurrence that home leave would lead to loss of a bed.
When my daughter was 3 years old we had to travel to Kendal hospital for about 6 weeks using public transport, that was difficult, costly and time consuming. Just recently my wife had to be admitted to Burnley due to Lancaster having no spare beds.
This resulted in poor care provision as the staff had no knowledge of her personality prior to illness or of the best way to deal with her. They then proceeded to discharge her before she had properly recovered causing extreme distress to our family who then had to cope with the aftermath of her actions.
All of this could have been avoided had local care with those who know her been available, and easy access for her family who have been very proactive in her care and recovery with daily input.
Let's just remind ourselves again that when Keith Dibble was asked "Do you accept that moving these women further away from their families and children could be damaging?" He replied "We believe not".
We are still telling you that it does. We have first hand experience that it does.
Start listening Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust. You are failing in your duty of care to us and we will not go away.
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