Core mental health standards

Annex A

Improvement and Implementation

A key aim of the core mental health and adult secondary specific standards is to be measurable and provide assurance that services are delivering for the people that use them. Making the standards measurable will allow services to understand how they are being implemented and whether they are being met. It will also make it easier for good practice to be shared and for any issues to be identified and addressed, therefore driving improvement in services.

We are mindful of the current pressures that the workforce and services remain under so have sought to adopt a proportionate phased approach to implementation and measurement.

We aim to do so through a self-assessment tool, which will be completed by service providers to evidence how they are implementing and meeting the core mental health and specific adult secondary standards. This will allow them to identify good practice that can be shared and any areas where improvements can be made. We will work collaboratively with Boards and IJBs in order to support any necessary changes. This tool will initially be piloted in selected areas before further roll out.

We will also develop key national measures. These measures will enable public scrutiny of services in key areas of the standards, and geographic comparisons both at an international and sub-national level. Wherever possible this will use existing data collection, including reforming the existing PHS Mental Health Quality Indicators. This data will be collected from Boards and will be analysed and published by Public Health Scotland.

Information gained from the self-assessment and the national measures will support Scottish Government’s planning and policy development in mental health.

Monitoring and measurement against the standards will be for anyone working in, or receiving care in the public sector (e.g health and social care). This may also include any third sector organisations who are commissioned to deliver care as part of secondary services.

As part of the NHS benchmarking network, we are currently engaged in temporary benchmarking data collection specifically for adult secondary services (2023). This data is being collected solely for improvement purposes but will also be used to establish a baseline against the standards and determine the feasibility of implementing longer term national measures. This approach is integral to our improvement strategy and our commitment to sharing learning.