Highlights from this issue

Mental health

Patients with mental health problems are frequent attenders in emergency settings and, regrettably, adequate provision for this group continues to fall well short of acceptable in most ED's, despite the acuity and vulnerability of these patients. Rightly or wrongly their definitive psychiatric care is often delayed if they have consumed alcohol or other substances, which can predispose them to even greater risk. A retrospective study by Urbanoski et al (see page 220) from Canada looked at frequent attenders with mental health disorders, delineating differences by number of attendances for substance use disorders (SUD) and predicted the receipt of follow-up services and 2-year mortality by level of ED use for SUD. Sadly but not surprisingly they found those with ED attendances for SUD were older and more likely to be men (ps <001) and as the number of attendances for SUD increased, the likelihood of receiving follow-up care (especially...

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