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💭   Alternatives to A&E for mental health risk reinforcing a dangerous divide between body and mind

Health

I wanted to feel optimistic when the NHS recently announced that it will be opening specialist mental health centres as an alternative to A&E for people experiencing a mental health crisis.1 Anyone who’s ever sought help in a hospital during a psychiatric crisis—as I have—knows that emergency departments can feel overwhelming, inappropriate, and even traumatising. A quieter, more compassionate space, staffed by people who are trained to support patients in distress, sounds like progress.But this approach could have unintended consequences. Psychiatric emergencies are often medical emergencies too, and creating separate mental health crisis centres could end up reinforcing the divide between physical and mental illness that we should be focused on dismantling.I've turned up to A&E before ...

BMJ     Jun 14, 2025