Latest
July 2009 National Confidential Enquiry[ on their front page - go to 'latest news' top right ] unsettling and alarming news
It's not to be buried or disguised, but to be taken very seriously, now.
The families and friends of the victim and the perpetrator are all affected by this, their neighbourhood, all other families with members who have schizophrenia; secure Units and prisons that have the long-term custody of them.
If it's accurate, it demands a better service that can intervene early, and as important keep people with schizophrenia, in care and in touch
The Inquiry found that there had been an increase in the number of homicides committed by people with mental illness at the time of the offence from 50 to over 70.
There was also a a rise in the number by people with schizophrenia - from 25 in 1997 to 46 in 2004 and an estimated 40 in 2005.
1997 ... all 54 ..... 2004 all 70 plus - say 74
1997 .. SZ 25 ..... 2004 SZ 54
1997 = ano 29 .... 2004 ano 20 i.e other serious mental illness has gone down.
[ This is what I can't follow: general rise 54 -70+ = 16 rise - schizophrenia 25 -46 = 21 rise - i.e. from schizophrenia, sufficient in itself to account for all the increase ??
yet one query to the Inquiry Team is answered like this - in those cases of homicides outside continuing care ,
.... ' depressive
illness was more common,
The diagnoses were extracted from the
psychiatric reports [ are these public documents - open in Court ? ]
which were written pre-trial,
to determine the mental state of the perpetrator
at the time of the offence. ]
Any previous contacts with the NHS Services is likely to be in those Reports, and maybe information within those Reports about GP contacts and the observations form there, should have led to more information being brought out by this Inquiry. It looks as though it received little ongoing ruminative reflection from monitors or this information would be available now.
Patients staying in continuing care show no such increase in these tragedies - but no reduction, which must be the aim.
Professor Louis Appleby, Director of the National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People with Mental Illness, said:
There has been an unexplained rise in the number of homicides by people with mental illness and we now have to try to understand why this has happened.
It is important to emphasise that the increase has not occurred in mental health patients..... It is also important to keep these findings in perspective.
The risk of being a victim of homicide in England and Wales is around 1 in 1,000
[ what's the base line ?? ... around 1 homicide per 100,000 population makes 1 victim per 100,000 !!!?? .....!!! and the risk of being killed by someone with schizophrenia is around 1 in 20,000. [ Ed. I can't follow this. The following figures are very rough but in the right order ]
Take generally the rate by adult people - say 500 adult homicides out of 40,000,000 adults - I make it 1- 80,000
But the population of people suffering from adult schizophrenia is approx 200,000 . Maybe one third of these are unstable, 70,000
If 40 annually is from this population the figure for Homicide, then it seems the proportion is 1/1700 .
please can someone with a sense of statistics sort me out !
Professor Appleby is right to point out that the increase in homicides, where schizophrenia was the illness, came from those outside the NHS service.
But when the perpetrator was in the NHS service, the Reports after Care and Treatment Inquiries
are that the service was not up to the standards required to maintain them within the service.
Not a question of blame.
In all but a very few, at the time, the service failed to get involved,
or was only part involved, or only able to be part involved, with the resources available.
Medication was often inadequate or not maintained.
What should be done about this ? ? The current talk is for early intervention - meaning before the illness takes hold and wrecks the life - can this be done is doubtful still - but rather neglects those who have 'dropped out' or never been known to service - or have been discharged 'we have nothing further to offer'.
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