North East London NHS Foundation Trust’s (NELFT) acute and crisis care pathway provides people with an integrated single point of access to all acute mental health services for adults. Aside from providing a single point of access, NELFT aims to provide strong HTTs as alternatives to inpatient care. The trust has a very high ratio of acute home treatment to inpatient care, as well as a low acute bed base. Its acute mental health services are made up of five acute recovery wards, four frail wards, one male PICU, three adult HTTs and one older adults HTT.
Co-Production
From start: No
During process: Yes
In evaluation: No
Evaluation
Peer: Yes
Academic: No
PP Collaborative: No
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Wellington Makala - Deputy Director – Acute Mental Health NELFT BME Ambassador
North East London NHS Foundation Trust’s (NELFT) acute and crisis care pathway provides people with an integrated single point of access to all acute mental health services for adults. Aside from providing a single point of access, NELFT aims to provide strong HTTs as alternatives to inpatient care. The trust has a very high ratio of acute home treatment to inpatient care, as well as a low acute bed base. Its acute mental health services are made up of five acute recovery wards, four frail wards, one male PICU, three adult HTTs and one older adults HTT.
The trust provides people with safe, effective and recovery-focused care, despite the low bed base, due to the strengthening of the HTTs. The teams have been able to gatekeep admissions into inpatient beds, thus resulting in more people being cared for closer to home, fewer admissions to inpatient services and elimination of out-of-area placements for a number of years. The teams have achieved this by being involved in all assessments including Mental Health Act assessments and also attending daily reviews for all the patients on the acute wards, which enables them to identify people who could qualify for early discharge. Both the inpatients wards and HTTs have dedicated consultants working as part of the integrated acute mental health care pathway and this reduces delays in decision making.
Furthermore, people receiving acute mental health care are provided with information about how to keep well in the community. This includes a 24/7 crisis number, details on mindfulness sessions, tai chi, IAPT services, and additional resources to learn about their medication and diagnoses.
The NELFT acute and crisis care pathway has been recognised as a centre of excellence in the Old Problems, New Solutions report. The integrated care pathway supports people to be cared for in the community by using a personalised and recovery-focused approach, which means that 97% of all people with mental health needs treated by NELFT are cared for in the community.
North East London NHS Foundation Trust’s (NELFT) acute and crisis care pathway provides people with an integrated single point of access to all acute mental health services for adults. Aside from providing a single point of access, NELFT aims to provide strong HTTs as alternatives to inpatient care. The trust has a very high ratio of acute home treatment to inpatient care, as well as a low acute bed base. Its acute mental health services are made up of five acute recovery wards, four frail wards, one male PICU, three adult HTTs and one older adults HTT.
The trust provides people with safe, effective and recovery-focused care, despite the low bed base, due to the strengthening of the HTTs. The teams have been able to gatekeep admissions into inpatient beds, thus resulting in more people being cared for closer to home, fewer admissions to inpatient services and elimination of out-of-area placements for a number of years. The teams have achieved this by being involved in all assessments including Mental Health Act assessments and also attending daily reviews for all the patients on the acute wards, which enables them to identify people who could qualify for early discharge. Both the inpatients wards and HTTs have dedicated consultants working as part of the integrated acute mental health care pathway and this reduces delays in decision making.
Furthermore, people receiving acute mental health care are provided with information about how to keep well in the community. This includes a 24/7 crisis number, details on mindfulness sessions, tai chi, IAPT services, and additional resources to learn about their medication and diagnoses.
The NELFT acute and crisis care pathway has been recognised as a centre of excellence in the Old Problems, New Solutions report. The integrated care pathway supports people to be cared for in the community by using a personalised and recovery-focused approach, which means that 97% of all people with mental health needs treated by NELFT are cared for in the community.
