Basic standards for management of patients with common mental illnesses in primary care

Psychiatr Danub. 2005 Dec;17(3-4):205-20.

Abstract

At least 95% of mental health problems are dealt with entirely in primary care. The other 5% are referred to secondary care, but these will be dealt with jointly by primary care services and secondary care services. Mental Health problems provide a major burden to primary care services, the doctors who operate in those services- the General Practitioners-, and their staff Standards need to be set in order to clarify what an adequate primary care response should be to the provision of mental health care. We propose a set of standards which are evidence based and which are correlated with the recent WHO declaration on Mental Health in Europe.

MeSH terms

  • Anxiety Disorders / epidemiology*
  • Anxiety Disorders / therapy
  • Depressive Disorder / epidemiology*
  • Depressive Disorder / therapy
  • England
  • Evidence-Based Medicine
  • Family Practice / standards
  • Humans
  • Patient Care Team / statistics & numerical data
  • Primary Health Care / standards*
  • Psychotic Disorders / epidemiology*
  • Psychotic Disorders / therapy
  • Quality Assurance, Health Care / standards
  • Referral and Consultation / standards