Older people “kicked out” of services

Older people under the care of assertive outreach teams are being
kicked out of services once they reach a certain age, according to
the chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation,
writes Katie Leason.

Andrew McCulloch told delegates at Community Care Live today
that it was “totally absurd” that practitioners in
assertive outreach teams were being told that they could not keep
seeing clients once they reached a certain age.

“If the assertive outreach model is good when you are 59
or 64 it may still be required when you are 66,” he said.

McCulloch added that efforts in general needed to be focused on
developing “older people friendly services”. One way of
doing this would be to engage more mature workers in providing
services, perhaps delivering brief interventions on a part time
basis within primary care.

“The idea that an older person with depression and
anxiety, and perhaps sexual dysfunction is going to talk to a
graduate primary care worker is not realistic. There’s a lack
of common sense here. To impose that type of model generally is not
good public policy in my view,” he said.