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How should a mental health liaison team communicate with general practitioners?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Mary-Anne Cotton  and
David Ellis
Mary-Anne Cotton
Affiliation:
Mental Health Liaison Team, Water-low Unit, Camden & Islington Community Health Services NHS Trust, Highgate Hill, London N19 5NX
David Ellis
Affiliation:
Mental Health Liaison Team, Water-low Unit, Camden & Islington Community Health Services NHS Trust, Highgate Hill, London N19 5NX
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Type
The Columns
Information
Psychiatric Bulletin , Volume 25 , Issue 7 , July 2001 , pp. 278
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © 2001. The Royal College of Psychiatrists

Psychiatric disorder following childbirth is common, and much of it is serious. After childbirth, women are at increased risk of suffering from an affective illness, and those with pre-existing psychiatric disorders may face a relapse or recurrence of their condition. Psychiatric illness occurring at this time may have an adverse effect not only on the woman herself, but on her marriage, family and, in particular, on the future development of her infant.

Perinatal mental health problems should therefore be of concern not only to those involved in maternal and infant care, but also to psychiatric services because child-bearing women will form a significant minority of their patients.

This new Council Report updates and replaces CR28 (published by the College in 1992) and a report published in 1996 in conjunction with the Department of Health. The revision takes into account developments in national health policy — including new commissioning arrangements, clinical governance and the National Service Framework for Mental Health — as well as the findings of key reports, including the Confidential Enquiry into Maternal Deaths (Why Mothers Die) (1998) and Fatal Child Abuse and Parental Psychiatric Disorder (1996).

The report recommends that:

  1. • Every health authority should have a perinatal mental health strategy that aims to provide the knowledge, skills and resources necessary for detection and prompt and effective treatment at all levels of health care provision.

  2. • Every health authority should identify a consultant with a special interest in perinatal psychiatry. This consultant should take a lead role in promoting these aims and in establishing a specialist multi-disciplinary team.

  3. • All women with a perinatal psychiatric disorder who require specialist psychiatric care should have access to a consultant and other mental health professionals with a special interest in their condition, irrespective of their place of residence.

  4. • Mother and baby units should be established to serve the needs of a number of health authorities.

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