Mental Health Service Redesign Initiative

Newham Perinatal Mental Health Team Intensive Care Pathway : East London FT

Perinatal mental health teams care for pregnant and postnatal women with moderate-to-severe mental illness, and are commissioned nationwide on the basis of acuity and risk: perinatal women can become rapidly and dangerously ill.

But perinatal teams don't deliver crisis care: they use other teams (A&E psych liaison; Home Treatment Teams) when patients require immediate or daily intervention. This results in patients most in need of expert care being referred into teams without specialist expertise; whilst patients lose continuity of care.

We successfully implemented an Intensive Care Pathway in our service, and now provide same-day urgent assessments, and daily home visiting.