The facilities for dealing with the psychiatric patient who presents at the Casualty Department leave much to be desired.The extent and nature of this problem is shown by the following study, in which one Junior Casualty Officer, who received 1,224 patients presenting with a new complaint over a period of three months, recorded the number of cases which he considered to be suffering from a primarily psychiatric condition. This amounted to 82 (6.6 per cent.), and, allowing for the fact that he was one of three Casualty Officers performing identical duties, this means that 984 such patients can be expected in the year. This is double the number of new cases referred to the Psychiatric Out-Patient clinic of this same hospital.
Informed consent and the psychiatric patient.
