Pharmacy has an important role in supporting mental health patients with their long-term treatment, mental health charities have stressed. 

Medicines management was "very important" when treating people with mental health problems, Andy Bell, chief executive for charity Centre for Mental Health, told C+D at a public health seminar in London earlier this month (December 9). Mental health charity Mind backed the comments and yesterday (December 22) told C+D pharmacists needed to be "skilled up" in dealing with mental health issues.

Pharmacies were also well-placed to identify people with undiagnosed mental health problems, Mr Bell said. He explained it was “very common” for someone with a physical disease such as diabetes to have a mental health problem - with up to a one in three chance of the two co-existing. “A big part of it is about identification where people have regular contact with pharmacy,” he said. 

Mr Bell added that having a pharmacy workforce “dispersed all around London and the UK” could help address the inequalities faced by mental health patients. "People with schizophrenia die 20 years too soon and that is a quality of health we need to put right,” he stressed.
 

Long-term support

Mind information officer Katherine Darton agreed that pharmacy's role in managing mental health problems was becoming increasingly important. "We know that people with mental health problems are more likely than the general population to have physical health problems such as obesity and are also more likely to smoke and abuse alcohol," Dr Darton said. 

"People with severe mental illness also die on average 10 years younger than the general population, often because of physical health problems associated with the adverse effects of medication," she added. "It’s key for pharmacists to be properly skilled up in how to engage with people with long-term mental health problems so as to discuss decisions about their treatment with them, including potential alternatives to long-term medication."

In August, Pharmacy Voice criticised a national report about improving mental health care, which was written by charities and professional bodies, for not including pharmacy. Chief executive Rob Darracott said there were half a billion yearly opportunities for pharmacy to engage the public on mental health.