The Scottish Government

Commitment 9

"[By 2009]We will establish acute inpatient forums across all Board areas comprising service providers, service users and carers as well as other stakeholders such as Local Authority colleagues."

Why do we need Acute Inpatient Forums?

Good inpatient care has several aspects, these include: ward culture; physical environment; activities within the ward; provision of information; access to staff ; access to psychological therapies, appropriate staff training; good risk management and safety; collection of appropriate data to inform service planning; integrated service provision and clear policies on challenging issues/behaviour.

Useful resources on improving inpatient care.

What will they do?

• Delivering for Mental Health: Establishing Acute Inpatient Forums and improving care report sets out how AIFs should be set up; who should attend them; who should be responsible for making the recommendations from the meetings happen; and what areas of improvement they should concentrate on.
• There should be an AIF for each NHS board area.
• AIFs will feed back on their activity through the Implementation Review process.

What are the next steps?

Representatives from NHS Boards accross Scotland met together in September 2007 and will meet again in February 2008 to discuss this committment and the progress towards it.

Mental Health Division, January 2008