Mental health in community care

Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) launched the Mental Health Integrated Community Care Project in August 2020 to capture the views of local people about the development of community mental health services. To complement Dorset CCG findings, Healthwatch Dorset visited local homeless support groups and drug and alcohol services to gather feedback from people who don’t always have a strong voice. They spoke to a total of 27 people, age 16 years and over in August and September 2020.

People said that there were long waiting times to access mental health services in the community. People who are using drugs and/or alcohol are unable to access mental health services in the community. All too often they were routinely prescribed medication instead of therapy. People were concerned about the lack of continuity of Community Psychiatric Nurses (CPN’s). They also felt they were not listened to and felt patronised. People are discharged if they miss an appointment. They didn’t have regular reviews of medication.

There were 6 recommendations about the need for mental health services to be better integrated with drug and alcohol services, how better to deal with missed appointments, improved access to mental health services in the community, training for staff and access to therapy.