Panorama, Mental Health Issues, Folks Locked Up In Police Cells...

[ferlew]

Is it time Mental Hospitals were re-introduced?
I think it is.

[pixie373]

There certainly are some still. Maybe not enough. I didn't see Panaroma though.

[ummmm]

We have them already. They never went away. They just changed from asylums to units. Asylums where they locked people up, fed them full of drugs and ignored them.

Units where they try and deal with the problem.

[EDDIE51]

A high % of people in prison have mental health problems, some sources say as high as 30% .

[ferlew]

I wasn't meaning the old Asylums, where they locked girls up for being pregnant, more the specific Mental Hospitals of the 50/60/70's.

[boxtops]

Having a quick check, Eddie, but the rate as reported from here is Much,Much higher..

http://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/help-information/mental-health-statistics/prisons/

So, this would mean that we'd have to build a lot of "assylums", or alternatively, change the name of HMP to HMA (Her Majesty's Assylum), just to make the changeover easier.

[pixie373]

No, the hospitals do exist. As Eddie says, i think a lot of people are in the wrong place. Wish I'd seen it, it sounds interesting.

[ferlew]

Iplayer Pixie??

[ummmm]

I used to work in one. There was quite a lot of patients that had been transferred from prison.

[pixie373]

I have on-demand. That might work! Thanks

[phleb]

I missed it where can i watch repeat

[ferlew]

It was beeb1, so I spose Iplayer.

[emmie]

they still exist, and i did watch some of the programme, very distressing.

[emmie]

not interesting if you are in one, take my word.

[pixie373]

I'm sure not, emmie. I expect there have been a lot of changes in the way people are treated in them (hope so, anyway).

[boxtops]

we still have them - if you Google NHS Health & Social Care Trusts, you'll find 'em, there are specialist Trusts and hospital units all over the country.

[EDDIE51]

When I was at junior school in the 1950s there was an asylum across the fields from the school. It was called The Three Counties Hospital but we all knew it was an asylum, it was huge there must have been 100s of people in there.
The teachers used to point it out and tell us that if we talked in class that was where we would end up. They used to tell us that talking in class was a sign of mental illness and we would be put in the asylum if we did it. That would probably not be considered politically correct now ! but there were 55 of us in the class and just one teacher that's the 1950s baby boom for you.

[Baby_Sham]

You haven't really given enough info as to what you mean, but I can't believe anyone would want the re-introduction of 'mental hospitals' from the 50s/60s.

As above, there are still 'mental wards' (if that's what you want to call them) so I don't get what you mean.

Please explain...

[EDDIE51]

This is a link to the Three counties asylum I mentioned and there is information about how mental health care has changed over the years .
http://www.fairfield-park.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=53&Itemid=63
It is a block of luxury flats now but at it's height had over 1,000 inmates.
It was used from 1860 right up to 1999 as a mental hospital.

[hc4361]

Too many people are 'care in the community' when they really can't cope - especially as the 'community' doesn't seem to give two hoots.
It is too easy for an individual to get lost in the system by failing to turn up for GP appointments, failing to take prescribed meds, mental health workers failing to turn up for appointments and failing to follow up.

MHUs are overburdened with too many patients (or clients as they are now called) - practically every day there is a news story about the failure of 'care in the community'. Cheaper than residential accommodation it may be, but at what price to the client, the wider family and the community as a whole?

Nobody wants to see the return of Bedlam but there must be a better way than what we have now.

[Jeza]

Wasn't a relative of the Queen Mother in an asylum for not conforming.