Mental health patients who do not attend appointments with the general practitioner

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One study suggests that mental health patients who miss two or more physician appointments within one year are eight times more likely to die in the next 18 months than those who do not. Are missing none.

The Glasgow University study included 274,547 patients with long-term mental disorders and surgeries performed in Scotland between 2013 and 2016.

Of those who missed appointments, 32.1% were addicts and alcoholics.

And among those who subsequently died, the average age of death was 49 years.

Lead author, Ross McQueenie, said: "Many people consider patients as lazy or lethargic when they miss an appointment.We think that this is usually not the case .

"People do not make a health appointment for fun, and if they miss an appointment, their health needs are not met."

• Missed doctor appointments cost the NHS £ 216 million
• Are waiting times for doctor's appointments longer?

A previous study from the University of Glasgow, published in the Lancet, suggested that general practitioners' practices in disadvantaged areas could better manage missed appointments, with strategies such as offering same-day appointments , for example.

But disadvantaged patients in wealthy areas were often excluded.

Professor Helen Stokes-Lampard, who chairs the Royal College of General Practitioners, said, "Appointments are missed for a variety of reasons – but this study shows why it is more important to be compbadionate to those who do not show up. not, rather than punish them.

"For some people, life is embarrbading and they forget, but others may not show up precisely because of their health problem.

"We need systems in place to better deal with these situations and the starting point is to have more mental health therapists based in primary care where the majority of mental health issues are identified and managed. .

"The long-term NHS plan announced this week guarantees our profession a significant share of the funding.

"We need these promises to become an urgent reality."