Emerald Ward
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Emerald Ward provides high quality mental health care to people with psychotic illnesses in an in-patient setting. Our goal is to support patient recovery, to promote mental and physical wellbeing and optimise independence and social inclusion.
Emerald Ward is a 16-bed mixed gender inpatient rehabilitation ward, which specialises in the treatment of complex patients with difficult to treat psychotic illnesses from the London Borough of Camden. The approach is multidisciplinary and holistic, with an emphasis on treatment optimisation.
- Borough(s): Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey, Islington
- Email: Proscovia.buyungo1@nhs.net
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Address:
Highgate East Mental Health Centre, 130 Dartmouth Park Hill, London, N19 5FJ
- Phone number: 0203 317 7041 / 0203 317 7040
- Service hours: 24 hours, including bank holidays
- Conditions treated
- How to access this service
- Who is this service for?
- What to expect
- Service manager(s)
Conditions treated
Primary diagnosis of a psychotic illness (i.e schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder or bipolar affective disorder
How to access this service
Referrals are made through acute admissions wards when this intervention is indicated. It can also come from Forensic services.
Who is this service for?
Service users with severe and enduring mental health conditions that require a sustained period of admission and treatment, to be supported with Activities of daily living and access to ongoing support in a community rehab setting. Service users often have complicated dependencies and higher risk factors.
As the North London NHS Foundation Trust, Sunstone ward covers patients who come from all 5 boroughs which are Camden, Islington, Barnet, Enfield, and Haringey.
The service is also for Service users who will have multiple of the following:
• Treatment resistance
• On-going positive symptoms of psychosis (e.g. delusions and hallucinations)
• Prominent negative symptoms (e.g. poor motivation, apathy, disorganisation)
• Impaired ability to manage activities of daily living (e.g. self-care, shopping, cooking, budgeting)
• Difficulty coping with community living and managing independent tenancies
• History of repeated relapses and hospital admissions which may have been prolonged
• History of risk to themselves, often due to serious self-neglect
• History of risk to others including possible forensic involvement
• Co-morbid mental disorders (e.g. personality disorder, depression, anxiety, OCD etc.)
• Cognitive impairment (as a result of premorbid learning disability, developmental disorders, brain injury or their longstanding psychosis)
• Complex physical health co-morbidities.What to expect
- A comprehensive psychiatric assessment
- Optimisation of medication (often including Clozapine +/-augmentation)
- Management of physical health problems including appropriate liaison with medical colleagues from the Whittington Hospital
- Assessment formulation and psychological intervention is offered by the ward clinical psychologists, which may include group therapy, family work or psychometric testing
- A full rehabilitation programme headed by the unit’s Occupational Therapist including attempts to link patients into community resources in preparation for move -on
- Specialist nursing interventions including support to improve activities of daily living
- Frequent liaison with community care coordinators to identify and resolve impediments to move -on
- Regular involvement of patients’ families and carers
We work towards building resilience, using a trauma informed approach. We work proactively as a multidisciplinary team to support our patients towards an appropriate discharge plan. This usually includes a period of graduated transitional leave, tailored to the person’s needs and in close contact with the local community placements.
Service manager(s)
Proscovia Buyungo (Interim Ward Manager)
Dr Matthew Allin (Consultant Psychiatrist)
Neill Wells & Joan Bradford (Matrons)
Kerry O’Brien (Head of Service)
