A growing number of children with mental health problems are being treated in adult psychiatric wards as services struggle to cope with increased demand following the pandemic, the National Health Service The watchdog has warned.
There were 249 admissions of under-18s to adult psychiatric wards in England in 2021-22, according to data provided by NHS trusts to the Care Quality Commission (CQC), up 30% from the previous year.
Of children admitted to adult wards, 58% of cases were due to the child needing to be admitted immediately for their safety.
But in more than a quarter of cases, 27%, the child was admitted to the adult ward because an alternative inpatient or community outreach service was not available.
The findings come more than 15 years after the government set a goal of ending inappropriate admissions of children to adult psychiatric wards. The number of admissions gradually fell but has now risen again, CQC figures suggest.
Dr Elaine Lockhart, chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ School of Children and Adolescents, said the figures were “a concern but not a surprise. We have many children and young people who have become sicker. Services are really struggling to meet their needs,” she said.
He added that mental health services across the country were facing a “perfect storm” due to “patchy” provision of intensive treatment services in the community and insufficient funding for early intervention.
“The bottom line is: We can’t do anything right now that feels safe enough to keep them home, so we have to admit them. And they go to beds that are not appropriate for them at all,” he said.
The number of children who need mental health care has risen sharply in the past two years, with those awaiting routine treatment between January and March 2022 rising 21% over the past year.
Two-thirds (66%) of the 1,697 under-18s had been waiting longer than the four-week target. The demand for eating disorders has increased particularly sharply.
young mindsa youth mental health charity, said the figures showed the burden on the system was “unsustainable” and that improvements were needed “not only in hospital care but also in community services that help prevent young people from becoming sick enough that they need to be hospitalized.”
Olly Parker, head of external affairs, added that being placed in an adult ward could be traumatic for children who were already extremely ill and make “a frightening situation” worse. This cannot go on,” he said.
NHS England said children should only be admitted to adult wards as a “last resort” and that although CQC figures showed an annual increase, such admissions had fallen in the last quarter despite “record demand”.
It added that it was investing in community mental health services “to ensure children get the support they need before hospital care is required…including deploying mental health support teams to 4,700 schools…and hiring of more than 4,500 employees.
