The Vital Role of a Full Continuum of Psychiatric Care Beyond Beds.
The authors make the case for expanding the national discussion of inpatient psychiatric beds to recognize and incorporate other vital components of the continuum of care in order to improve outcomes for individuals with serious mental illness. They review the varied terminology applied to psychiatric beds and describe how the location of these beds has changed from primarily state hospitals to the criminal justice system, emergency departments, inpatient units, and the community. The authors propose 10 recommendations related to beds or to contextual issues regarding them. The recommendations address issues of mental illness terminology, criminal and juvenile justice diversion, the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, mental health technology, and the mental health workforce, among others. Each recommendation is based on findings from publicly available data and clinical observation and is intended to reduce the human and economic costs associated with severe mental illness by promoting a robust, interconnected, and evidence-based system of care that goes beyond beds.
['Pinals|Debra A|DA|', 'Fuller|Doris A|DA|']
D003156:Community Mental Health Services D004637:Emergency Services, Psychiatric D006297:Health Services Accessibility D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand D006742:Hospital Bed Capacity D006778:Hospitals, Psychiatric D006801:Humans D001523:Mental Disorders D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care D009626:Terminology as Topic
Systems issues in serious mental illness