Safely home: what happens when people leave hospital and care settings?

Healthwatch England looked at the issue of discharge from hospital.

With the help of 101 local Healthwatch, we heard from over 3,000 people who shared their stories with us about their experiences of the discharge process. People told us that they were either discharged before they were ready, or that they were kept in care for too long, which had a significant and detrimental effect on their lives. 

Many people said that, although they may have been deemed medically safe to leave hospital, they did not feel safe or adequately supported to do so. Others told us about experiences of delays to their discharge and the significant consequences of being kept in care too long. Throughout this inquiry, we focused on the experiences of older people, homeless people, and people with mental health conditions – three groups for whom the consequences of a failed discharge process were particularly detrimental. These three groups are not mutually exclusive. In many cases, homeless people experience mental health as well as physical health problems, as do older people, thus contributing to the complexity of their needs and the particular importance of ensuring that they receive all the support they need after discharge.

We found that there are five core reasons people feel their departure was not handled properly: 

1. People are experiencing delays and a lack of co-ordination between different services; 

2. People are feeling left without the services and support they need after discharge; 

3. People feel stigmatised and discriminated against and that they are not treated with appropriate respect because of their conditions and circumstances; 

4. People feel they are not involved in decisions about their care or given the information they need; and 

5. People feel that their full range of needs is not considered.