Care pathways

About 50% of the patients in Priory Group's 15 acute psychiatric hospitals and almost all of those placed in our 12 secure, complex care and rehabilitation hospitals are funded by the public sector.  For all our NHS-funded placements, both acute and long term, we liaise systematically with the NHS at PCT level and also through proactive engagement with community services so that the care packages we deliver are seamlessly integrated within wider care pathways, facilitating a safe and timely passage back to the community.

Our aim is to focus from day one of every admission on specified placement objectives.  Our inpatient services actively plan for discharge and expect the involvement and support of Tier 3 in this.  To this end we systematically engage with CMHTs and community CAMHS, for example offering educational programmes and seminars and jointly running clinical networking events. Our relationships with commissioning teams enable swift action when there is inadequate participation in the CPA process by local care coordinators in the NHS or social services.

Priory has an increasing number of block contracts, service level agreements and preferred provider arrangements with NHS organisations. We have also developed strategic partnerships with NHS Trusts, jointly delivering services.  In the context of these structured commissioning arrangements we work proactively to help the NHS understand referral patterns for our services so as to identify and tackle anomalies in demand.