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One of the most difficult aspects of my job as a psychiatrist is talking to patients who have to wait a long time before being treated.
All members of the front-line mental health teams want patients to have the best experience possible. Unfortunately, when people have to wait for the help they often need, it's hard not to have the impression of letting them down. I would be lying if I said that it's not stressful and sometimes it does not take away the sense of great satisfaction that comes from being a psychiatrist.
Royal College of Psychiatrists research conducted by ComRes Last September, one in four people diagnosed with mental illness had to wait more than three months before receiving help.
For some people, when help arrived, it took the form of an assessment appointment, but that did not mean that they were automatically receiving a treatment program.
One respondent stated, "I was seen quite quickly, but the follow-up did not occur for six months and during this period, my condition (of OCD) was so aggravated that I had to leave the university and this had a real impact. on my life. I lost my friends, I had to go back to my parents and this sparked a negative spiral. "
Another man told us that waiting for treatment for his mental illness meant that he had tried to commit suicide several times. In total, he had to wait 13 years to get the help he needed.
When their health deteriorated, respondents also pointed to the much greater impact this could have on their lives. 37% reported having relationship difficulties, including divorce, 32% of financial difficulties and 34% lost their jobs.
Unfortunately, these stories are not unique. Working in mental health services is something we hear on many occasions.
It is no secret that we need a stronger mental health workforce within the NHS to be able to help and, among the mental health workforce, we need more psychiatrists.
Since it takes several years to become a psychiatrist, there is no quick fix to remedy the situation.
We are working tirelessly to promote this incredible branch of medicine to attract more doctors to choose psychiatry as a career. We start to see green shoots as a result. This year, we had the largest number of candidates for basic training in the last five years.
Several factors are likely contributing to the success of our social media campaign, longer-term awareness-raising work in medical schools, and the societal revolution around mental health that has undoubtedly helped to reduce the stigma associated with work. with people with mental illness.
However, despite this success, much remains to be done. We can work as hard as we can to attract people to the specialty, but we need to make sure that the mental health landscape becomes attractive enough to keep them there.
Patients waiting without support are one of those issues that profoundly affect NHS workers. We need to make sure that we recruit to positions across the country so that patients do not unfairly wait for an appointment or they do not have to travel miles to get treatment.
We must ensure that the money promised for CCG is used and not diverted elsewhere. For the moment, this varies and in turn creates a vicious circle, putting the staff in place under increasing pressure. This means that it can be very difficult to recruit and retain staff. That's why we must continue to monitor closely those who control the planning of our NHS workforce and the commissioning and provision of mental health services to ensure they keep their promises.
We want the government and Health Education England to work with us to ensure that medical schools have plans to give students greater exposure to psychiatry through quality internships and an encouraging curriculum. more of them to continue their careers aware of career opportunities in the field of mental health in order to take advantage of the growing interest of younger generations in this area.
When I come back on my career and all its challenges, would I have chosen differently? No way. I believe that as a psychiatrist, I have the best job and the pleasure of seeing people recover from the ravages of mental illness, day after day, never leave me. This is a message that we want to shout: Psychiatry is extremely rewarding, we can help and help people to improve themselves and to enable them to continue living. In my book, it's not much better than that.
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