WIREDGOV

CQC’s annual assessment shows that care quality ratings have been maintained overall in England – but people’s experience of care is determined by whether they can access good care when they need it.

Providing the right access to the right care at the right time is increasingly key to the sustainability of health & social care as services struggle to cope with increased demand.  When people can’t access the services they need, the risk is that they are pushed into inappropriate care settings – ending up in emergency departments because they can’t access the care they need outside hospital, or in crisis because they can’t access community based mental health and learning disability services.

Difficulties in accessing the right care can mean that people with a learning disability or autism end up detained in unsuitable hospitals. CQC’s ongoing thematic review, which begun in 2018, highlighted the prolonged use of segregation for people with severe & complex problems who should instead be receiving specialist care from staff with highly specialised skills.

This year’s State of Care considers & pressures faced by health & social care as a whole – but focuses particularly on inpatient mental health & learning disability services, the area where CQC is seeing an impact on quality.  Read the State of Care 2018/19 summary online and download the full report.

While the overall quality picture for the mental health sector, which includes community mental health services, remains stable, this masks a real deterioration in some specialist inpatient services which has continued after 31 July 2019, the cut-off point for the data included in the report.

Since October 2018, 14 independent mental health hospitals that admit people with a learning disability and/or autism have been rated inadequate and put into special measures.  Two of these services have since improved, 3 are now closed and 1 service is still registered, but is closed to new admissions with no people resident.

Although inspectors have seen much good and some outstanding care, they have also seen too many people using mental health and learning disability services being looked after by staff who lack the skills, training, experience or support from clinical staff to care for people with complex needs.