Question

What could be the immediate impact of a daily presence of a psychiatrist on a few essential aspects of the functioning of a mobile crisisteam (such as a rapid response when the demand arrives, a clear treatment plan at the  moment of inclusion in the team)?

Problem description

We experience an insufficient presence of our psychiatrist within our organisation.  In theory, they are present 3 out of 7 days, and this to a very limited extent. It’s about a theoretical maximum of 14 hours per week, for consultations and client contacts within the mobile crisis team. In practice it is less in some weeks, because of holidays and study days

Impact - effect

This has a major impact on the functioning of the team and also with moments leads to frustration. It causes a longer waiting time for our patients. It is not unusual that clients have to wait longer than a week for a psychiatric consultation. This is regrettable,  considering a delay occurs of the starting up  of any medication. But it also has an negative impact on the team.  The team gets a high sense of responsibility, but is also happens that the direction of the work must be changed after the consult with the psychiatrist.  It is not possible to plan a clear treatment trajectory at the time of inclusion

To do

To do: the best scenario would be to increase the psychiatrist hours. In NHN we found two full-time psychiatrists present in the IHT (intensive Home Treatment). What they considered as a necessity. By default, these psychiatrists were also present at the intake and do make home visits. Additionally, team members had many conversations in the office, which was a great saving of time and cost, and which also gave them the opportunity to involve the psychiatrists in their conversations when this seemed appropriate. Taking into account that this ideal scenario seems to be difficult to achieve at present, a daily presence of psychiatrists on weekdays would already provide an added value

Theme

Role of psychiatrists

Topic

Number of hours/week available for the team, number of WTE psychiatrist (full-time, part-time..)

Reference -  contact

Ellen Beets

Mobile team

2a

Project

Noolim

Intership abroad - place

Noord-Holland-Noord (IHT)

Date

September 2014