Mental health patients left languishing in hospitals for years

Some mental health patients are being kept in psychiatric units for years because there is not the mental health care available in the community to support them, an investigation by the Independent has found.

The paper’s analysis showed that 3,213 patients were stuck on units for more than three months last year, including 325 children kept in adult units. Of these, some were well enough to leave but could not be discharged.

The average stay for patients in low-security hospitals in 2022-23 was 833 days. The Independent saw leaked reports that show that NHS community services are struggling to see patients, while the NHS is spending hundreds of thousands of pounds a year to house patients who could be discharged.

The documents for 2022-23 obtained and analysed by the paper reveal:

• Adult mental health beds cost the NHS between £500 and £1,000 a day, compared to £5,000 per patient per year for community care
• One in five referrals for community care was rejected
• Patients waited 13 weeks on average to see a community mental health worker, but some waited up to 60 weeks
• The 3,213 patients stuck for more than three months represented an increase of 639 on the year before and an all-time high
• In August, 10% of patients were waiting 221 days to start community treatment
• One in 10 patients under a community mental health team did not see a healthcare worker for a year

Long stays have become ‘normalised’

Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive for NHS Providers, which represents hospitals, told the paper that mental health patients stuck in hospitals were experiencing “personal distress” and getting ill again while they wait. She called on the government to put mental health on an “equal foot” with physical care, and said that not doing so suggested the government was content not to treat all patients equally.

The Independent quoted a senior NHS source as saying that long stays in mental health units had become “normalised” and patients were becoming institutionalised: “These 60 and 90 [days] stayers are just being medicated and drifting. They’re adjusting meds to stabilise the person … These long-stays people can get completely dependent, they lose contact with the world [and] their life. They’re terrible for people.”

Councils argued over payment

The paper also spoke to a patient, Ben Craig, 31, who says he was left “scarred” after being stranded on a ward for two years – despite being fit enough to leave – because two councils argued about who should pay for his supported housing.

Craig was admitted to Prestwich Hospital in September 2019 with psychosis from prison after he began hearing voices.

In 2020 he was told by doctors he was well enough to be discharged home after his sentence ended. However, the two councils disagreed about who should fund the mental health hostel he needed to be discharged into.

He was eventually discharged into supported living in September 2022 where he still receives mental health support.

Craig told the paper: “I was very depressed – I am still not over it properly yet. When I was there, I just didn’t want to go out or anything, so just stayed in my bed all the time. I missed my daughter’s birth, and I didn’t see her until she was two months old…it’s left me scarred.”

Even when he was finally discharged into supported living accommodation he says the community mental health team had “no input” into his care.

Rhian Davies, head of Mind’s legal unit, said: “It’s deeply concerning that people are finding themselves stuck in hospital, their lives on hold, due to a lack of supported housing. Delays in leaving hospital cause uncertainty and anxiety that can hamper or even reverse recovery.”