The challenges and tragedies of mental health issues

One day as autumn was fast approaching I was bleeped to an A&E resus bay. A 21 year old woman had been brought in who’d been found hanging at home. I watched the team work on her but the resus attempt was unsuccessful and the young woman died. 

I waited for the family to arrive and spent some time with them. The mum was obviously distraught. She was alternatively blaming herself and the mental health services at the hospital for not picking up on how ill her daughter was. Her daughter was known to the psychiatric services as she was a self harmer. She had recently split up with her boyfriend and this had tipped her over the edge. What can you say at a time like that? Words are just so inadequate. All I could do was keep the supply of tissues coming and try and stand firm as all that raw emotion washed over me.

Eventually the family calmed down and started to ask me questions. I explained that a post mortem would be necessary and I went through that process with them and what would happen next. When they were ready I walked them to their car and offered continued support if they needed it.

As I walked back into the A&E department I was aware that my shoulders were really stiff. I must’ve absorbed more emotion than I realised. Now the family were gone my attention was turned to the staff. Some needed to talk, some just wanted to be busy. Everyone has their own coping style. I stood talking to the nurse who was preparing the body for the mortuary, when a psychiatric liaison nurse came in. She had just heard and was shaken because she had spoken to the young woman a couple of days ago. She was really upset. I spent some time talking to her and followed this up with some phone support. 

The psychiatric services turned the situation into a Serious Untoward Incident. SUI’s have to be investigated. I sometimes wonder if we couldn’t do a bit better as institutions. SUI’s make people nervous and mean that people often end up responding from a defensive position. Am I being utopian to want a system where people can learn from any mistakes and changes are made so that those situations are unlikely to occur again? This would be possible if it was done in a more supportive way instead of the legalistic framework that currently exists.