Patients who absent themselves from hospital or fail to return at specified times from authorised leave, are not always AWOL for ever – in fact, most of them aren’t. Those patients whose detention in hospital occurred via the criminal justice system and who are on restricted hospital orders, for example, will remain AWOL until they […]

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Today marks one-year since West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) launched their Mental Health Response Vehicle (MHRV) service.  In their press release, WMAS tell us their five vehicles have supported over 7,200 patients “to access specialist mental health paramedics, improving the quality and experience of care.”  The MHRVs are staffed by specialist “mental health paramedics” who have […]

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In October, His Majesty’s Coroner for Sunderland issued a Preventing Future Deaths (PFD) report after the inquest of Mr John Hurst.  It concerns mental health assessment in police custody, information sharing between the NHS and the police and, crucially, pre-release risk assessment by custody officers. Unfortunately, none of this is anything we haven’t heard before […]

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