Plans to open new mental health unit at Blackpool Victoria Hospital move one step closer

The county's mental health trust hopes to convert the old anti-coagulation dosing advisory service (ADAS) ward into an urgent assessment centre, and was granted planning permission in September.

And now planning chiefs have approved further building work, which includes building a canopy over the entrance.

The unit will be manned round-the-clock by a total of 20 full-time and 15 part-time medics tasked with rapidly assessing over-16s who turn up at A&E with symptoms of seriously poor mental health.

They can also examine those on the wards, and pass on their thoughts to GPs and other agencies within 24 hours.

The unit will have three assessment rooms, a reception area, medical office, meeting room, nurse's office, staff room, toilets, and staff showers, planning papers showed.

It was expected to open in February and was prompted by the pandemic, trust documents added, but is now set to open in March.

Similar facilities are already open elsewhere, including in Lancaster and Morecambe, and "support more timely mental health intervention for patients that arrive in A&E and who do not require additional physical health support".

The ADAS, which is run by consultants and gives advice to around 6,500 patients on oral anti-coagulant therapy, moved in October and is now next to the gastroenterology department and can be found off the hospital's main corridor.

In October, three mental health patients were kept waiting for more than 12 hours inside the Vic's A&E, with the delays said to "warrant further monitoring and analysis if this becomes a trend", health bosses were told at a recent meeting.

The patients had to wait for a bed for 23 hours, 37 hours, and 44 hours respectively, which chiefs admitted "clearly reflects an unacceptable patient experience", though they were told there is an "established link between bed availability and the incidence and length of 12-hour A&E breaches".

The Lancashire and South Cumbria NHS Foundation Trust (LSCFT) said: "The Fylde Coast Mental Health Urgent Assessment Centre (MHUAC) has been created to support those who attend the Emergency Department (ED) in mental health crisis.

“The practitioners within the MHUAC will support people from the ED in assessing and supporting people, so they access the right care and treatment, this will also include working collaboratively with the staff in the acute trust.

“LSCFT is hoping to open the MHUAC in March next year.

"It will be staffed by the current Mental Health Liaison Team, which will include senior mental health nurses, health care support workers, associate nurses and psychiatrists.

“The purpose-built unit will be situated close to the ED and provide a calm and safe environment, where people will receive holistic assessments and be encouraged to bring carers, family or friends to aid with the assessment process should they choose to do so.”

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