An 18-year-old woman suffering from a mental health crisis was forced to wait eight-and-a-half days in an emergency department before being given a bed in a psychiatric hospital – believed to be the longest such wait seen on the NHS.
Louise (not her real name) had to be looked after by police and security and slept in a chair and on a mattress on the floor in the emergency room at St Helier’s Hospital in Sutton, south London, because there was no available bed in a mental health facility.
She became increasingly “despondent, despondent and despondent” as her ordeal continued and her mental health deteriorated while she waited, self-harming by banging her head against a wall. Twice he went into hiding because he didn’t know when he would finally start inpatient treatment.
The woman’s parents, David and Angela, are so upset by her ordeal that they wrote an account of it for the Guardian. In it they tell how they and their daughter were told the NHS could not find a bed for her in a psychiatric facility either locally or anywhere in England.
Louise arrived at St Helier on the evening of Thursday June 16 and was not given a bed in an NHS psychiatric unit until the early hours of Saturday June 25, more than eight days later. She was diagnosed last year with emotionally unstable personality disorder and ADHD.
Mental health charity Mind said it believed it was the longest A&E wait ever endured by someone experiencing a mental health crisis and described it as “unacceptable, disgraceful and dangerous”. He called for urgent action to tackle inadequacies in NHS mental health provision and bed numbers.
“An eight-and-a-half-day wait in AG for a mental health bed is both unacceptable and disgraceful. The mind has never heard a patient in crisis wait so long to get the care they need, and serious questions must be raised about how anyone – let alone an 18-year-old – was left to suffer for so long without care she needs,” said Rhian Davies, Head of Legal at Mind.
“It’s dangerous for staff who aren’t trained to provide the emergency care a patient needs, and dangerous for a patient who needs that care immediately – no more than a week later.”
“This should be a red warning light to every single person involved in the decision-making that has led to this appalling situation, from the leaders of the trust to the Secretary of State himself. A situation like this is indicative of the dire state our crisis mental health services are in,” Davis said.
Chris Grayling, the family’s MP, told them in a letter when they sought his help that “what you are experiencing, I think, is a wrong move away from the provision of inpatient beds in mental health services. I have doubted this over the years, but this has been a long-standing trend among mental health trusts.
He added: “Your case is not the first such case I have come across.”
The Surrey and Borders Trust apologized to Louise for her ordeal and said it was due to “severe pressure on our beds”.
“We strive to support the people who need our care and we sincerely apologize when there are instances where we fall short of the expectations of the people who use our services,” said Lorna Payne, chief operating officer.
“We have experienced significant pressure on our beds in recent weeks and when bed pressure occurs our first priority is to ensure people are safe. We assess the clinical needs of each individual.
“Unfortunately this sometimes means people may be waiting longer than we would like, and sometimes it means we look to our partners in the emergency hospital sector to help us.”
Add Comment