"crisis team"

We are sorry to hear of your experience and appreciate the sense of frustration you are feeling, particularly at such a stressful time. However, we do need to point out that the single point of access number you are referring to is not a crisis helpline for patients and service users. It’s primarily a resource for healthcare professionals, but the number is given to patients who are open to receiving telephone support from the team between visits. We are aware there have been some difficulties at busy times, and we are exploring ways to reduce the wait people have in accessing the service by phone. Between 9am and 9pm there is a dedicated person to answer the phone on home treatment which is option 2 – if you are receiving care from the crisis team only, this is the option you should use to access urgent support - and our teams will have advised you of this. If you are receiving care from a community mental health team and need urgent help during normal working hours, our advice is to contact them. It’s not clear from your feedback whether you were advised/reminded of this but we are grateful to you for highlighting this as a potential issue and as a result, we will be issuing a reminder to our teams to ensure they give this advice at the appropriate times. We provide the following information for patients and service users on the appropriate channels for getting urgent help: If you are already receiving care from our services and you need urgent help during normal office hours you are asked to contact the service providing your care. If you are not already in our care you are advised to ask your GP. Help is provided outside normal office hours by the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland GP out-of-hours service, NHS 111, Samaritans, FocusLine and SaneLine. Alternatively, we advise that you attend your nearest emergency department or dial 999 for an ambulance in the case of an emergency. This advice and information is also available on our website at www.leicspart.nhs.uk . We will always welcome the opportunity to discuss your experience with you in person and we’d ask you to contact the service, or you can speak, in confidence, to our trained customer service advisers who will provide support and information for you and investigate your concerns. You can email them at customerservices@leicspart.nhs.uk or ring them between 9am and 5pm on weekdays – tel: 0116 295 0830 or 0831.