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Inquiry needed to discover why black people are more likely to be admitted to mental hospitals than white people

London Zosia Kmietowicz

The first ever census of the ethnicity of people using mental health services in England and Wales has shown that Black African and Caribbean people are more likely than the general population to be admitted to hospital, detained under the Mental Health Act, physically restrained, and secluded.

The census, which took place on 31 March this year, covered almost 34 000 mental health inpatients in England and Wales (90% of those eligible) who used services provided by all 102 eligible NHS trusts and 110 independent providers.

In a joint foreword to the report, Healthcare Commission chairman Ian Kennedy and Mental Health Act Commission chairman Kamlesh Patel call for a prompt investigation for the reasons behind the findings and improved routine ethnic monitoring of services to meet the needs of users.

"Ethnic monitoring has been mandatory in publicly funded mental health services since 1995. That it has not . . . [Full text of this article]

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An unfortunately premature publication that is bound to cause more of the trouble that it seeks to prevent

Ikechukwu O. Azuonye
bmj.com, 7 Jan 2006 [Full text]