Project overview
The Crisis Care Concordat launched in February 2014 as an England-wide effort to improve quality and availability of help and support for people experiencing, or at risk of experiencing, a mental health crisis.
This included support before reaching crisis point, urgent access to safe, respectful and effective care in an emergency, quality of treatment and care in a crisis, support for recovery and the prevention of future crises.
Twenty-seven national bodies signed up to the Concordat, representing health, the police, social care, housing, local government, and voluntary and community sector organisations.
Implementation was very much at local level, with local areas responsible for working together to develop and implement the Concordat aims.
McPin was commissioned by Mind to carry out the evaluation of this implementation between May 2014 and December 2015.
Project details
Our evaluation helped provide a more detailed picture of how the work of the Concordat progressed at local level.
Through the evaluation we were able to:
- Assess the progress and impact of rolling out the crisis declarations at a local level
- Develop an understanding of the factors for success, as well as the major challenges and obstacles for local areas in signing up to and embedding agreements into their working practices and protocols.
- Produce learning and recommendations for how local partners can work together effectively to improve the experience of people in mental health crisis
Four local areas were chosen as case studies and in each we used observations and interviews to develop our understanding of the process of developing and implementing the action plans – including exploring experiences of partnership working, the main challenges and achievements, and thoughts on the future of crisis care.
We also analysed a sample of action plans from across the country and undertook two nationwide surveys with service users and carers who have experienced crisis care.
Finally, we interviewed some of the members of the national steering group representing the Concordat signatories.
It was clear from our evaluation the Concordat has been successful in encouraging local areas to develop partnership working across a range of factors, incorporating prevention and recovery as well as the delivery of urgent care to people experiencing, or at risk of, a crisis.
One particular area of success was a more than 50% reduction in the use of police cells as a Place of Safety for people experiencing a mental health crisis.
We were also pleased to discover there had been some significant improvements in service users’ experiences of crisis care in the 12 months between November 2014 and November 2016. While this is from a relatively small sample, it is nevertheless an encouraging result.
There were several successes as a result of the Concordat work, however there was also a concern among stakeholders (including people who responded to our survey) that momentum is maintained to continue to improve crisis care.
This includes crisis care for children and young people. Although all local areas made a commitment to improving provision for children and young people, it was also acknowledged at local and national level that there is still a huge amount of work to be done.
You can read more in our report, summary report and infographic.
For more information about the project, please email [email protected].
Project resources
Crisis Care Concordat implementation evaluation
Crisis Care Concordat implementation infographic
Crisis Care Concordat implementation summary evaluation
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