New Spectrum publication!
Another Research study was completed by Spectrum earlier this year. This was funded by The Eastern Health Foundation and focuses on ambulance attendances involving personality disorder.
Mon, May 19
Key findings
Although there is a relatively small representation of Victorians requiring mental health-related ambulance attendances for personality disorder-related difficulties (9632 people; 4.1%), fewer than 10% of them accounted for half of these ambulance call-outs. i.e. the most frequent ambulance service users (798 service users; 20+ attendances each) required ambulance services on 38,167 occasions over a 6.5-year period.
75% were female and 65% were aged 34 years or younger. This contrasts with the ‘all other mental disorders’ group who were less likely to be female (55%), with 42% younger than 34 years.
The prevalence of suicidal and NSSI presentations in this population was substantially greater than among people with other mental disorders.
88% were transported to the emergency department
These findings highlight the need for evidence-based alternatives to reduce the incidence of mental health crises and reliance on emergency services.
Click here to see and download a summary of the findings. Alternatively see the graph below. Click here to read the complete research paper.
