Evening Standard

On 19th December 2006 appeared an article in the Evening Standard written by the Journalist Sue Arnold about her experiences with the Mental Health Services regarding her son who has been diagnosed with Schizophrenia. I reproduce here
some excerpts which strongly resonate with what many Carers in our borough have been and are concerned about and the issues that many of us have been bringing up at endless meetings with the Mental Health Trust, the Social Services, the D. of
Health, our MPs, in endless Meetings over many years. The changes we have experienced are an increased amount of paperwork in the form of Guidelines, National Frameworks, Reviews issued by different bodies, like the Mental Health
Trust, the Healthcare Commission, the Royal College of Psychiatrists. Alas, all these noble exercises have not resulted in
any noticeable implementation. On paper everything sounds perfect, the reality however, is very much like the excerpts
that follow: The mental health charity SANEs Marjorie Wallace advice: "Tell them that if anything happens to your son, you will hold them accountable". "Providing support before the accident happens was not the NHS mental health department's forte"
"The psychiatrist, who had never seen my son before, said that, in his opinion, there were not sufficient grounds to section him. I told him that the duty social worker, who has known my son for three years, had absolutely no doubt that he was extremely unwell and needed to be in hospital. SANE has analysed 69 independent inquiries into mental health related
serious incidents and found that one in three could have been prevented if doctors used a little more common sense and were less concerned with being politically correct. I talk to the duty nurse in my son's ward at the Chelsea and Westminster
Hospital every day. He often says the Consultant, who has not seen my son yet, is coming. I tried to speak to her just now but she is not taking messages. Don't worry, Ill tell her you called and you need to talk to her, said a switchboard operator, but it is after 6pm and nobody has contacted me". Above everything else, it is the TOTAL LACK OF COMMUNICATION that infuriates. - ward nurses who say they've never heard of the doctor who has been treating my son for two years, bed managers who direct you to the wrong hospital, social workers who haven't got round to seeing my son for three weeks because they are so busy, duty psychiatrists who go off duty without passing on vital information to their replacements.
Parents do not feature on the communications list. "Is he changing medication? When is his next tribunal? Is he going to another hospital? I ask and I am told they are not at liberty to divulge confidential information without my son's consent. He is the judge. But, right now, his tormented mind is incapable of judging anything. Families, especially mothers, who, when everyone else has washed their hands of the whole thing, are still there, begging and battling, hoping, waiting, praying, need to be kept informed, not shrugged off like an irritant. I shall still be here providing the only continuity, the only certainty my son knows."