Using primary care-based mental health registers to reduce social exclusion in patients with severe mental illness.
Reducing social exclusion and improving mental health are key themes within the government's modernization programme. Despite this, little is known about the social exclusion experienced by people with severe and enduring mental illness living in specific communities, apart from their over-representation amongst various socially excluded groups. This paper describes a 3-year research study that focused on the impact of introducing mental health registers into general practices in an English health district. The registers were expected to facilitate improvements in linking patients with appropriate services and so improve the healthcare they received. The overall result should have been reductions in the levels of social exclusion experienced by these patients; however, findings revealed a lack of change in unmet needs and quality of life, even amongst those in contact with a community mental health nurse.
D001294:Attitude to Health; D003152:Community Health Nursing / Q000458:organization & administration; D003156:Community Mental Health Services / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004739:England; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000451:nursing / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D028642:Persons with Psychiatric Disorders / Q000523:psychology*; D015404:Nursing Methodology Research; D011320:Primary Health Care / Q000592:standards*; D011568:Psychiatric Nursing / Q000458:organization & administration; D011788:Quality of Life; D012042:Registries; D012494:Sampling Studies; D012918:Social Alienation / Q000523:psychology*; D012922:Social Change; D013222:State Medicine / Q000592:standards