Emergency department–focused mental health policies for people with severe mental illness

The Australasian College for Emergency Medicine (ACEM) has released a major report on Australia’s mental health system: Nowhere to go: Why Australia’s health system results in people with mental illness getting ‘stuck’ in emergency departments (hereinafter the ACEM Report: https://acem.org.au/Content-Sources/Advancing-Emergency-Medicine/Better-Outcomes-for-Patients/Mental-Health-in-the-Emergency-Department/Nowhere-Else-to-Go-Report). The report is significant for several reasons. First, ACEM joins the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) in national advocacy for improved mental healthcare (Jenkins, 2019; Judkins et al., 2019). Second, the report presents a clear case for an emergency department (ED) focus in national mental health policymaking, along with well-defined outcome measures including ED length of stay (LOS). Finally, the report takes a balanced approach to community and hospital services