Skip to main content

Table 1 Original themes that emerged from the data, grouped according to the ‘nature of the liaison teams’ and the Principles of Integrated Care by Suter and colleagues [14]

From: Integrated liaison psychiatry services in England: a qualitative study of the views of liaison practitioners and acute hospital staffs from four distinctly different kinds of liaison service

Original themes

Groupings

Role of liaison psychiatry

Service development and history

Diversity of work

Components of liaison services organised in different ways

Aims and purposes of services

Types of patient problems seen by liaison services

The nature of the liaison teams

 

Principles of Integrated Care (Suter et al., 2010) [10]

Confusion about the referral process to liaison services

Inappropriate referrals including patients with no mental health problems

Onward referral and signposting

Co-ordinated transitions in care across the continuum

Value of assessments

Response to non-engagement

Helping patients to manage mental health issues better via informal learning opportunities

Description of the clinical process

Continuing support and assessment of needs

Brief interventions or follow-ups during admission

Medication prescribing

Preventing suicides

Avoiding exacerbating long-term mental health problems

Improving quality of life

Improving adherence to medication for physical health problems

Improving clinical outcomes for patients

Patient focused care

Gaps in service provision

Interaction with external psychiatry teams Difficulty in accessing community services

Primary care network structures in place

Relationships with referrers

Collaborative working

Training and education- Influencing team members and acute service colleagues

Inter-professional team working and team effectiveness

Notes and recording systems

Time taken to record information

Duplication of record keeping

Absence of shared record keeping

Information systems which enhance communication capacity and information flow across integrated pathways

Physical space and identity

Problems with commissioning of liaison teams

Visibility

Organisational goals and objectives aligned across sectors

Hierarchies in mental health and acute trusts

Alternative perspectives regarding training of acute staff

Physician integration within care teams and across sectors

Reduction in length of stay

Limiting time patients spent in ED

Better communication with commissioners

Promoting safe and efficient services-mismatch between staffing levels and volume of referrals

Specialism versus generalism

Influencing commissioners to expand systems

Influencing mental health trust managers

National models and structures

Perceived prioritisation by commissioners

Promoting safe and efficient services

Attainment of goals and objectives are supported by funding and human resource allocation

What liaison services wanted to change- internal delivery processes and structures

Challenges in delivering training

Address mental health stigma amongst acute services colleagues

Alternate persectives about training

Do not map onto a specific principle