Children as young as
12 'failed by Government'
as they are left on adult
psychiatric wards
Official NHS rules say kids with mental disorders should never be admitted to adult wards and the Department of Health had promised this would stop by 2010
Britian's top psychiatrist has accused the Government of failing mentally unwell children by forcing them to be treated on adult wards.
Official NHS rules say kids with mental disorders should never be admitted to adult wards.
The Department of Health had promised this would stop by 2010.
Yet alarming new figures show hundreds of under-18s – some as young as 12 – with mental health problems are being treated on adult psychiatric wards.
Dame Professor Sue Bailey, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: “We are at a tipping-point in mental health.
“It is completely unacceptable that children are having to be treated on adult psychiatric wards.
“One in 10 children has a mental disorder yet they seem to be seen as a lesser form of human being. We have got it now in legislation. The words are there but the deeds do not follow.”
Health watchdog the Care Quality Commission has been alerted to the crisis triggered by cuts to services and a shortage of specialist children’s beds.
It means vulnerable youngsters are treated alongside adults, denying them access to specialist paediatric nurses and education services.
And they face a greater risk of physical and sexual abuse.
A Daily Mirror inquiry this month showed thousands of children aged 10 and under are being treated for depression, stress
and anxiety.
and anxiety.
We also told how two-thirds of local authorities have had to cut budgets for early intervention schemes due to the Coalition’s policies since 2010.
Data from 51 of the 58 NHS mental health trusts in England showed that 350 under-18s have been admitted so far to adult mental health wards in 2013/2014 compared with 242 two years earlier.
Incredibly, 10 NHS trusts revealed they had been forced to send children more than 150 miles away for care.
Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust said it had to transfer one child 275 miles to Bury, Greater Manchester, because there was no bed available nearer home.
Dr Michael McClure, from the Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust, said: “Sometimes we have to make 50 to 100 phone calls looking for a bed.”
Dr Jacqueline Cornish, NHS England’s national clinical director for children, said the body is conducting a three-month “rapid review” into the scandal.
Sarah Brennan, of child mental health charity YoungMinds, said: “The terrible increase we are seeing in children on adult wards was predictable as soon as early intervention services were cut.”
The Department of Health insisted that children and young people’s mental health is a priority.
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