An Audit of Planned Follow-Up Following Discharge From Four Black Country CRHT's

AIMS: It is well established in the evidence base that mortality and suicide risk increases following discharge from an inpatient admission, leading to the national implementation of ‘72 hour follow-up’. However, there is little data examining outcomes following discharge from an admission to a Crisis Resolution & Home Treatment Team. Following a number of noted Serious Untoward Incidents at a trust level, we sought to examine the standard of follow up post discharge from all four Black Country CRHT's (Dudley, Walsall, Sandwell and Wolverhampton) in order to improve policy and thus patient outcomes. METHODS: The caseloads for all four CRHT's for the period of 1st-31st December 2021 were obtained. The clinical notes system RIO was searched and scrutinised for each patient to determine when the patient's next planned follow-up following discharge from that particular spell in CRHT took place. This was compared to the audits standard: all patients discharged from CRHT should receive some form of planned follow-up in the 3 month period post discharge. RESULTS: All of the patients discharged from Wolverhampton CRHT received 72 hour follow-up as conducted by members of their own team, however despite this 12% of the total caseload were either lost to long term follow-up or went into crisis before planned follow-up could take place. With regard to Dudley and Sandwell, only 51% and 47% of patients respectively were routinely followed-up within 3 months. A total of 30 patients across all 4 CRHT's went into crisis before planned follow-up took place. One patient ended their life 4 months following discharge from the CRHT; no planned follow-up took place. All of Walsall CRHT's patients were followed up on discharge unless they were discharged directly back to their GP. CONCLUSION: Timely, regular and robust follow-up embedded in the community mental health team is paramount to the provision of safe psychiatric care. This audit has also uncovered the need for follow-up for patients discharged from CRHT to their GP, as this cohort of patients is sizeable. However we argue that a one off ’72 hour/7 day follow-up’ is insufficient when reducing morbidity and mortality, and robust long term care plans and regular follow-up should instead be a feature of longer term community mental health care.