Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust runs a specialist

mental health trust A mental health trust provides health and social care services for people with mental health disorders in England. There are 54 mental health trusts. They are commissioned and funded by clinical commissioning groups. Patients usually access t ...

and provides

learning disabilities Learning disability, learning disorder, or learning difficulty (British English) is a condition in the brain that causes difficulties comprehending or processing information and can be caused by several different factors. Given the "difficult ...

, addiction management,

acquired brain injury Acquired brain injury (ABI) is brain damage caused by events after birth, rather than as part of a genetic or congenital disorder such as fetal alcohol syndrome, perinatal illness or perinatal hypoxia. ABI can result in cognitive, physical, e ...

services and the provision of community nursing and therapies services in The City of Liverpool and Sefton. It provides secure mental health services for the North West of England, the West Midlands and Wales, one of only three NHS organisations in England offering high secure services. It also runs mental health wards at Rathbone Hospital in

Wavertree Wavertree is a district of Liverpool, England. It is a ward of Liverpool City Council, and its population at the 2011 census was 14,772. Located to the south and east of the city centre, it is bordered by various districts and suburbs such as ...

, the Broadoak Unit at

Broadgreen Hospital Broadgreen Hospital is a teaching hospital in the eastern suburb of Broadgreen in the city of Liverpool, England. The hospital, alongside the Royal Liverpool University Hospital and Liverpool University Dental Hospital in the city centre is man ...

, Mossley Hill Hospital, Windsor House on Upper Parliament Street in Central Liverpool and Heys Court in

Garston, Merseyside Garston is a district of Liverpool. Historically in Lancashire, it is bordered by the suburbs of Grassendale, Allerton, and Speke. It lies on the Eastern banks of the River Mersey. History In medieval times, Garston was home to a group of B ...

. The trust gained

Foundation trust A foundation trust is a semi-autonomous organisational unit within the National Health Service in England. They have a degree of independence from the Department of Health and Social Care (and, until the abolition of SHAs in 2013, their local s ...

status in May 2016.

Development

The Trust opened a new hospital, Clock View Hospital in Walton in 2014. It has a psychiatric intensive care unit for people who need intensive short-term treatment and assessment. It took over Calderstones Partnership NHS Foundation Trust which had a turnover of £42 million per year in 2015. About 130 patients from the Calderstones site had been into alternative services by 2019. It planned to move patients with "exceptionally complex mental health disorders" to a new 40-bed low-security unit in

Maghull Maghull ( ) is a town and civil parish in Sefton, Merseyside (historically a part of Lancashire). The town is north of Liverpool and west of Kirkby. The area also contains Ashworth Hospital. Maghull had a population of 20,444 at the 2011 Cens ...

, but has been unable to secure capital funding. In 2016 it took over the former

Walton Walton may refer to: People * Walton (given name) * Walton (surname) * Susana, Lady Walton (1926–2010), Argentine writer Places Canada * Walton, Nova Scotia, a community ** Walton River (Nova Scotia) *Walton, Ontario, a hamlet United Kingdo ...

Carnegie library in order to set up a new centre for learning, recovery, health and wellbeing. It acquired the failed

Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust Liverpool Community Health NHS Trust was one of the community health trusts created in 2012 under the Transforming Community Services programme. It provided controversial services for people at the end of their life, Liverpool Care Pathway later n ...

in increments over 2017/2018. The trust was one of the beneficiaries of

Boris Johnson Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (; born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer and journalist who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He previously served as F ...

's announcement of capital funding for the NHS in August 2019, with an allocation of £33 million for a new 40 bed low secure unit for people with learning disabilities. In November 2019 it was reported that the trust was to take over

North West Boroughs Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust North West Boroughs Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust was an NHS foundation trust which provided mental health, learning disability and community health services in fifteen boroughs of North West England. The Trust delivered mental health and lea ...

. It started a COVID Oximetry@Home service in April 2020. This enables monitoring of more than 5000 patients a day in their own homes. The technology, provided by digital health company, Docobo, allows nurses, carers, or patients to record and monitor vital signs such as blood oxygen levels.

Performance

It was named by the '' Health Service Journal'' as one of the top hundred NHS trusts to work for in 2015. At that time it had 3,448 full-time equivalent staff and a sickness absence rate of 5.77%. 58% of staff recommend it as a place for treatment and 53% recommended it as a place to work. 493 patients were injured in 2016-17 through use of

restraints Physical restraint refers to means of purposely limiting or obstructing the freedom of a person's bodily movement. Basic methods Usually, binding objects such as handcuffs, legcuffs, ropes, chains, straps or straitjackets are used for thi ...

on psychiatric patients in Merseycare NHS Foundation Trust. This was the second-largest number in England, There were more injuries in

Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust is an NHS foundation trust which provides community health, mental health and learning disability services across Hampshire. It is one of the largest providers of such services in England. History The trus ...

. Critics say restraints are potentially traumatic even life-threatening for patients.Figures reveal ‘alarming’ rise in injuries at mental health units
''

The Observer ''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the ...

References

External links

*{{official website, http://www.merseycare.nhs.uk/ NHS foundation trusts Medical and health organisations based in Merseyside NHS mental health trusts