If it wasn’t for this place, I could have ended up in a psychiatric ward

7:38am Monday 7th April 2008

By James Connell

A PENSIONER says he may have ended up in a psychiatric ward without help from a mental health service which now faces the axe.

Bob Leveritt has battled depression and anxiety for the last decade but was saved from entering a psychiatric ward by nurses at Sheffield House in Malvern.

The eight-bed unit at Sheffield House, Malvern, faces closure because NHS officials say the number of people using the service has dropped significantly.

Mr Leveritt, who is chairman of the Malvern branch of mental health charity Mind, stayed at the unit for two months in the summer of 2006, and again in October last year after being referred to the service by a nurse from the Malvern community health team.

Mr Leveritt, aged 66, of Lansdowne Terrace, Malvern, takes Prozac for his depression, which worsened when he thought that he would lose his eyesight because of cataracts and a detached retina.

He believes the unit provides vital support to people who are mentally unwell but not so ill that they need acute psychiatric care.

He added: "Friends of mine have said to me if I hadn't had the fallback of Sheffield House I may have finished up in a psychiatric ward at the Worcestershire Royal hospital in Newtown Road. What worries me is vulnerable people slipping through the net."

Mr Leveritt said he was concerned generally about a reduction in local mental health services and that Sheffield House provided valuable, 24 hour one-to-one care for patients from a nurse and nursing assistant.

But a spokesman for Worcestershire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust, which runs the centre, said: "I can advise that Sheffield House has less than 50 per cent occupancy, although full staffing has to be maintained, making it a very expensive service for a small number of service users."

Harriett Baldwin, prospective parliamentary candidate for West Worcestershire, has met Rethink and Malvern Mind, two organisations dealing with mental health issues in the area, to discuss the implications of the centre's closure.

She said: "What is clear is the value of Sheffield House as a facility. It offers a very different atmosphere to the Royal, which is more institutional and treats people with long-term mental health requirements."

The future of the unit, in Court Road, will be discussed at Worcestershire County Council's health overview and scrutiny meeting at County Hall, Worcester, on Tuesday, April 15.