I feel like you used to hear about people being sectioned for their own safety all the time until about 20 years ago, but now in my small town you've got people with obvious paranoid delusions allowed to roam the streets, I work with the public and some of these people believe things like there is a grand conspiracy to poison them within the town and because I work for X company I'm part of it.
I know these people have been reported to social services, but they don't appear interested in anyone who isn't actively looking for help, even though surely people that delusional are a danger to themselves and others?
Do people still get sectioned?
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I work in forensic psychiatry so see people I know/met all the time. Before that I worked in 3 different prisons so see some people like a revolving door unfortunately
If YOU try to section me Mark you will have crossed a line and I will section you, so help me…
Yes, I have been. You really have to be an imminent risk to yourself or others. The preference is community care.
My dad, twice. Paranoid schizophrenia and depression. Both times he was given ECT, it’s the only think that works. He was okay for 8 years, taking anti depressants and anti-psychotics, then had a relapse. He’s been out of hospital 3 years now from the last time.
The criteria for being sectioned are adhered to much more strictly now than in the past, particularly because there’s far less resource available now than there has been in the past. To be sectioned, and more importantly for your question, to be kept detained long term you need to be seriously dangerous. The primary goal of most psychiatric detentions is now to get you stabilised sufficiently for safe release into the community and then to be treated ongoing either through primary care or your local mental health trust.
Can confirm though, people do still get sectioned and detained for long term psychiatric treatment. I served on a coroners jury a couple of years ago for someone who died whilst in long term involuntary treatment.
I work in homelessness so see lots of people sectioned. The issue is that the demand for beds these days is incredibly high, so thresholds are also extremely high. Lots of people sadly slip through the gaps. More funding into mental health (and the NHS in general) is desperately needed.
Yes, it does happen, however unfortunately due to a lack of beds the threshold for detaining someone under the mental health act are much higher.
The grounds for detention are danger to self and others. Delusions are not always dangerous.
Plot twist, they’re not entirely interested/able to help those actively seeking it either
My friend was 2-3yrs ago when he was found sitting on top of a multi storey car park after calling all his loved ones to say goodbye. Spent a month or so ‘inside’ before rejoining the real world. Fortunately he’s in a much better place these days.
A friend of mine was sectioned for a short time. They let him out and later that afternoon he jumped off a multi storey car park and killed himself. My wife also had a friend that was sectioned and had attempted to take her life a couple of times. She was released and killed herself later that week. In both instances family felt that the mental health services had massively let them down.
My granother has been involuntarily sectioned for the last 3 weeks. She was sectioned previously about 10 years ago.
I was sectioned and had paranoia induced psychosis. Haven’t had a relapse since I left the hospital though thankfully. You get sectioned when you refuse help from a doctor.
Yes, a relative sectioned 3 times. Everytime she was actively trying to off herself. The lead up had just been constant referral to CAHMS. There is not enough space in the system to take people if they are not an imminent threat to themselves or others.
Unfortunately yes. They have bi polar 1. They came off their medication and started using crack cocaine and alcohol.
They were really successful and lost it all gambling. Through this they were diagnosed with bi polar.
It’s terrifying to watch and trying to get the crisis team and social worker was a nightmare. It took him being nearly beaten to death to get re admitted into the hospital.
The person they were to what they are now really is night and day. We had to step away to protect our own mental health.
I’ve known (professionally) innumerable people with utterly bizarre beliefs and / or full blown delusions
To be honest at first I wondered why they weren’t put away somewhere for their own good. Over the years I’ve come to realise the vast, vast majority of people with delusions will never harm themselves let alone someone else
They might make some other people uncomfortable and some of them don’t take great care of themselves, but that’s surely better than locking them up in what is effectively a prison
I worked as a mental health solicitor for a while and I obviously saw it a lot but generally, those being sectioned under civil sections were quite unwell at the point of section. There is a strict criteria to meet to deprive someone of their liberty (understandably) and bed spaces are very limited.
Personally, a friend and my SIL have both been sectioned a number of times
I had a friend who was trying to get herself sectioned because she was in crisis and knew she needed help after a suicide attempt. They kept her in for 24 hours then let her go. She was really disappointed but ended up paying for help and turned out ok in the end. It took a while, but she got there.
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One of my parents was sectioned several times during my childhood. I think the thresholds have been dramatically reduced since then, and we’re seeing the outcome of that in various ways.
My mums old next door neighbour… every few months! She was an absolute danger to herself and others though.. she’d be ok for a few weeks after coming out then spiral! Setting fires in her home and locking herself in.. trying to set fire to her neighbours on the other side and screaming “fucking pedo” at anyone who walked past.. getting right in their face! Or chasing school kids from the local secondary as they walked home.
She was the nicest person at any other time! Completely split personality.
My mum moved into a bungalow after that so we never knew what happened to her. But i still think about her from time to time.
Yes they do. My ex was. It’s shit and scary for everyone involved. Takes a lot to get to that point hence why it’s shit and scary.
I was home sectioned in 2007.
Every day a doctor came to my home, have me meds and made sure I took them and spent about it time talking to me.
I also had to see a psychiatrist every Tuesday.
Yes. A person who had repeatedly attempted or threatened to commit suicide. Even then, they were released to non confinement care and soon after killed themselves.
Yes , they do , but it’s much less of a stigma nowadays , mental health is much more understood nowadays , that’s why you don’t hear of it much..just IMO OC
Not sectioned but admitted to a mental health ward. I kept trying to off myself due to depression. After the 2nd time I said I’m not coming back. That was 10 years ago. Haven’t been back. Turns out I still have depression but autism too. I was with people who had severe schizophrenia & psychosis. I saw a woman pour boiling hot water over head.
It felt like prison despite the fact ive never been.
Literally nothing to do for like 18-20 hours of the day . if your lucky you get to watch tv but there was no therapy, no care, no books, no radio, not allowed out to the garden just give you loads of meds to make you a zombie.
one of my good friends was sectioned when we were in secondary school – the place she was in was awful and honestly the way we treat mental illness in this country is diabolical – more like prison than a hospital
Yes.
Section is for immediate needs and/or danger to others. These cases you are seeing either have been assessed as safe to treat at home or they have no-one to advocate for their needs.
My girlfriend has been sectioned twice – when she was a teenager and when she was 22, both times for a few weeks. Both times she said it was like being in prison, and she got awfully treated by the nurses – she said she wasn’t even treated like she was a human being in there. Her anxiety got really out of control and combine that with unhealthy family dynamics and awful bullying in her secondary school years it multiplied.
She’s in a much better place now thankfully and is a manager of a charity shop as well as being a very savvy businesswoman, and she is one of the strongest people I’ve ever met. But man I can tell its had an impact on her. Mental health awareness in the UK is better than it used to be but yet we still need to make some serious progress.
My aunt has been sectioned multiple times. She gets violent when she has her turns. A lot is environmental I think, but she’ll never change.
I just got out of a double whammy sectioning last year. That was my 3rd and 4th time and I’m in my 30s. Was in for 2 months got out on my birthday then a week later back in. I have bipolar but pretty high functioning when I’m not in an episode. I only seem to get the mania side of things and not the depression. I am a menace when in a manic episode though and the sectionings were needed. I’m actually pretty ok most the time. It’s just when these episodes hit every few years or so I become a different person. I have friends, wife and a job (which is proving more difficult to hold)
Yes! My best friend during college.
He was my boy, call him Chris, but my god he has trouble adjusting to things. Basically, if he liked something he would do it to the most dedicated degree you can imagine, and there is no in between. He was a machine. Essentially, he was from the country and sort of uneducated in the ways of town life. He was a sensitive soul, but was eager to mix with everyone however he could. Naturally, this meant drinking in college. We had quite a large group of friends, and he was generally very well liked in the group. He was a big lovable teddy bear kinda guy.
Well, let’s just say alcohol did not treat him very well. As soon as he started drinking, you could tell he really liked it. He would suggest drinking at every opportunity, even when it wasn’t appropriate, he started to turn into quite the party animal, and was really, really proactive at setting up parties for people to come and join. And to be honest, it was kinda cool to have someone sort so much shit out for seemingly no benefit, he performed his social glue function pretty flawlessly.
Chris was also 2 years older than us, so he was able to drive before any of us… He failed his test 17 times, but apparently 18 was the charm. I’m sure you can see where this is going. So he became not only the party facilitator, but also transport. He’d really go the extra mile to make sure everyone got to his parties. He’s break into like abandoned barns out in the country, set up music equipment, get in a load of drinks, and ferry everyone a from quite a fair distance away. He was really, really into.
Well, eventually his drinking life and his driving life coincided a bit too much, and he crashed his car into a tree. He was fine physically but he was basically having a manic episode. He had cheated on his girlfriend, broke up with her, got drunk, blown up with his parents, been kicked out, and now crashed his car. He got out, took off his shirt, lit it on fire and shoved it into the petrol port. Boom.
He was caught in under two hours, and jailed. And as part of it, he was sectioned under the mental health act, and he had to spend time in an institution. He didn’t talk much about it, but he always spoke of the institution in pretty high regard. He’s not really the sort of person to be upset over his mistakes, he recalled quite liking meeting the interesting people at this institution. Said he met some really nice people there and had a pretty nice time and a positive experience.
I went to try and find his facebook, but he seems to have deleted it. Last time I remember seeing him on there he was really into the gym, and seemed to have a nice girlfriend. Good for him.
These days you have to do some pretty spicy stuff for it to happen.
Been an informal. tThey hold the threat of a good old sectioning over your head though if you are informal so it’s basically a paperwork hack on their behalf or it feels like it.
With the NHS Long Term Plan and the recent ammendments to the Mental Health Act, there is a push to treat people using ‘least restrictive practice’, so minimising the amount someone’s human rights and freedoms are limited. That means there was been a greater effort and amount of services that treat people at home, rather than in hospital.
When someone’s personal safety and the safety of others are at imminent risk, that’s when they look to place some under the Mental Health Act and section them.
Aside from the cynical view that “Hospitals are understaffed” and “There aren’t enough beds” (both are shockingly true), there is solid evidence to support treating someone at home rather than in a hospital- obviously not all cases, but it is supported.
https://www.england.nhs.uk/mental-health/mental-health-learning-disability-and-autism-inpatient-quality-transformation-programme/reducing-restrictive-practice/
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/the-british-journal-of-psychiatry/article/home-treatment-for-acute-mental-healthcare-randomised-controlled-trial/5652EC9C0BB44EC9C2D4AB59F93FC9C6
Yea about 20y ago this friend of ours pretended he’d won the lottery, hosted a big dinner and dance in a hotel ballroom etc, bankrupted himself and got sectioned, never heard of him again
Yes, for cannabis induced psychosis. About 40% of the people there were there for the same reason and every time I mention it on Reddit I get downvoted.