On 15th December, for the very first time in its history, a pre-legislative Parliamentary Committee of leading MPs and Lords sat at the National Assembly. The Committee came to take evidence on the draft Mental Health Bill and their witnesses included Minister for Health and Social Services, Jane Hutt and David Melding AM, Chairman of the Health and Social Services Committee.
Why did you choose a career in mental health?
I had always had an interest in caring for people and whilst growing up had come into regular contact with older people living in the residential home where my grandmother and mother worked…
The access people with a mental illness have to GPs, essential health screening services and healthier lifestyle initiatives is to come under the scrutiny of the Disability Rights Commission’s (DRC’s) powers of Formal Investigation.
The DRC’s investigation, which will run for 18 months, will gather evidence on whether primary health services are addressing the significant health inequalities experienced by people with a mental illness and people with learning disabilities.
We talk to Phil Chick, Wales’ Director for Mental Health, about his first year in the post, and the state of mental health services in Wales today…
Doctors are to be given new NICE guidelines for prescribing anti-depressants, following claims that too many are being prescribed to people with mild to moderate depression…
New research published in the British Medical Journal suggests a link between the use of cannabis in adolescence and young adulthood and later psychotic symptoms…
A team of researchers at Imperial College has suggested that discrimination could lead to an increase in mental health problems among gay men, lesbians and bi-sexual men and women…
This independent external review into a 2003 homicide looks at where systems may have failed in providing care for Paul Khan, a Cardiff resident who has schizophrenia.
The date for the Cardiff evidence session on the draft Mental Health Bill has been announced. The Committee will take oral evidence in public at the National Assembly at 10:05am on Wednesday 15th December.
Witnesses at the session will include Minister for Health and Social Services Jane Hutt and David Melding, AM, Chairman of the Health and Social Services Committee at the Assembly.
The Joint Parliamentary Committee on the draft Mental Health Bill announced last week that an evidence session will take place in Wales…
Frontline NHS services in Wales are to get a £30million boost for buildings and equipment…
Researchers at the University of London have discovered that the UK has seen the steepest rise in the prescription of antidepressants to children…
As the draft Mental Health Bill is prepared to be put before Parliament, a former mental health patient and a mental health carer from Wales are heading for London to deliver crucial evidence.
A new study from Denmark suggests that there may be a link. Published in the November issue of the British Journal of Psychiatry, the study set out to discover whether prenatal exposure to analgesics may affect the development of the nervous system of the foetus, leading to an increased risk of schizophrenia in adulthood. Results show that mothers who take analgesics in the second three months of pregnancy are four times more likely to have a child that will develop schizophrenia.
