The mental health workforce is to gain 21,000 new posts treating an extra million patients a year to help deliver Theresa May’s promised “revolution” in the sector, the Government has announced.
Jeremy Hunt today reveals his plan to redress the “historic imbalance” between physical and mental health by 2021, which has seen rising numbers of patients being treated miles from home.
The health secretary is promising round-the-clock, integrated psychiatric services for the first time, including an additional 4,600 specially trained nurses working in crisis centres.
Around 2,000 new staff, made up of nurses, consultants and therapists, will be dedicated to child and adolescent mental health, while nearly 3,000 posts are to be created for adult talking treatments, such as cognitive behavioural therapy for people with depression.
Health leaders last night welcomed the plan, but said it will only work if methods are found to limit the high attrition rate of staff working in mental health.
The Government will attempt to lure back some of the 4,000 psychiatrists and 30,000 trained mental health nurses no longer practising the discipline in the NHS, as well as encouraging more GPs to undergo psychiatric training.
A campaign will also be launched encouraging more trainee doctors to specialise in mental health.
“We want people with mental health conditions to receive better treatment, and part of that means having the right NHS staff,” said Mr Hunt.
“We know we need to do much more to attract, retain and support the mental health workforce of the future.
“Today is the first step to address this historic imbalance in workforce planning.”
Jeremy Hunt will try to redress the ‘historic imbalance’ Credit: Telegraph
Parity of esteem, the principle by which mental and physical health are given equal priority, has been a legal duty in the NHS since 2013, but in many areas the reality has not matched the ambition.
Last month new figures showed almost 6,000 mental health patients had to be sent out of their local area in 2016, a 40 per cent rise in two years.
Meanwhile the Care Quality Commission recently criticised the current “Victorian” approach to mental health, revealing that 3,500 patients are being locked up in secure wards when they should be receiving treatment.
The new posts will be funded from a £1 billion package for mental health up to 2020 announced by David Cameron in January 2016.
During this year’s general election, Theresa May pledged to scrap the “flawed” Mental Health Act as part a drive to revolutionise the sector.
Spokesman for the British Medical Association, Dr Gary Wannan, said: “The government rightly recognises that mental health services will not be able to cope with the increasing demand for talking therapies, child and adolescent mental healthcare and crisis treatment if they cannot hold onto existing workers and attract new trainees.
“This must be welcome to those who use and provide services who have experienced first hand the effects of recent cuts.”
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