New standards are needed to protect vulnerable individuals seeking mental health services.
As a recent investigation unveiled, there has been an ongoing sexual abuse scandal within the National Health Service (NHS) system with hundreds of victims being harmed by mental health services providers. In the aftermath of the investigation and newfound public awareness, officials are demanding that changes be made to the structure of the services to make such events less likely to occur.
As the details of this case started to come to light, one particular issue became the focal point of the situation – the use of unregulated healthcare workers. While roles like doctors and nurses are filled by individuals who have to come through very specific, formal paths to earn their positions, that’s not the case for some of the other roles that are filled in healthcare facilities. Without formal qualifications or requirements, there is concern that some of those working in such a capacity may pose a greater risk to vulnerable patients.
Some of the leadership in this situation are calling for a new framework to be used that would create a professional register and improve the quality of things like background checks. It would seem that these changes could go a long way toward making it less likely that vulnerable individuals would become victims.
While such a solution does sound appealing, the reality of putting such a system into effect could be challenging. NHS mental health services leans on a huge number of these kinds of workers, with more than 6,000 each of healthcare assistance and support workers. Those numbers are dramatically up in recent years, so more and more individuals would need to be put through whatever kind of framework is put into place.
Standardizing the titles and roles across hospitals and the rest of the healthcare system would likely help to improve the situation, as well. Currently, the unregulated workforce in healthcare doesn’t have the kind of job consistency with regard to qualifications and professional standards as does the rest of the industry. Bringing that field together with better standardization would be a big step in the right direction. It will certainly take time to both create and implement such a wide-ranging system, but the long-term benefits would make it worth the effort and investment.
There is unfortunately no way to assure the safety of mental health patients while they receive treatment, in the same way the safety of any other kind of patient can’t be assured. With that said, steps can and should be taken in the direction of adding layers of protection that can help these vulnerable people remain safe while getting professional care. If any good can come of this tragic situation, it’s that there may be more safeguards put in place to prevent future patients from going through the same experience.
Sources:
Calls for action over unregulated care workers after NHS mental health abuse scandal exposed
Mental health patients ‘raped and sexually assaulted’ as NHS abuse scandal revealed
‘I said no but he did it anyway’: Mental health patient sexually assaulted in NHS hospital
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