Mental health services in the UK in pretty bad shape

Main Category: Mental Health
Article Date: 24 Jul 2004 - 9:00 PDT

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More than one-third of mental health trusts have been awarded one star or fewer by the Healthcare Commission in its annual performance ratings for NHS trusts. For the year ending March 2004, seven MHTs received zero stars - double the number that received zero stars in 2003.

Healthcare Commission chair Sir Ian Kennedy said this was a significant cause for concern and, following the announcement of the ratings, the commission would be working with MHTs to help them improve their performance.

While reasons for the low ratings were 'complex', Sir Ian particularly singled out data quality as a problem. 'The information which the NHS collects about the care of people who use mental health services is simply not good enough,' he said. 'It must be improved to ensure the better care of patients.' Commission head of information and analysis Lorraine Foley noted that there were two areas where MHTs struggled with data quality. The first was in building a minimum data set, and the second was in developing unified records for mental health patients.

Primary care trusts overall performed particularly well, with a 14 per cent increase in the number of trusts awarded two stars. Three-quarters of PCTs now have a star rating of two or three stars. However, there were significant regional variations, with 86 per cent of PCTs in northern England getting two or three stars, compared to 39 per cent in London. Not one PCT in the capital has achieved three stars. According to Ms Foley, while the variation required more analysis, it was possible to see that London PCTs were not performing as well in the improving health section. 'So that is things like MMR immunisation, teenage pregnancy and smoking cessation,' she said.

The ratings assess performance in a range of areas, including meeting government targets, clinical factors, experience of patients and the way in which a trust is managed. This year, the ratings were modified to include more information gathered directly from the patients.

Public Health News, UK