King's College London

In a new report, ‘A matter of life or death: A rapid review assessment of London’s safeguarding adults reviews to inform the future of mental health adult social care under a new Mental Health Act’, the NIHR Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce (HSCWRU) at King's examines and amplifies the learning from Safeguarding Adults Reviews published across all London Councils between 2017 and 2020. The research team, led by Caroline Green, also consulted Coroners’ Reports to Prevent Future Deaths.

The research was commissioned by LondonADASS (Association of Directors of Adult Social Services) and is jointly published by King's and the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration South London.

The analysis suggests that there are specific groups of people who require particular attention when it comes to improving adult social care for people with mental health problems. There are also two major problem areas: first, professional knowledge and use of the Mental Capacity Act 2005 and second, inter-agency working and communication.

Elaine Allegretti, Director of People & Resilience, London Borough of Barking and Dagenham, who is LondonADASS’ Mental Health lead provided the foreword to our report. She said: ‘This report is the first of its kind to use these two data sources together to identify recommendations to improve the wellbeing of those with mental health problems in London and to highlight that safeguarding must be part of social care support for people experiencing poor mental health. Any new mental health law must include safeguarding of the rights of people with mental health problems from neglect, abuse and exploitation’.

Caroline Green introduces the report on the HSCWRU blog.