To investigate the use of additional conditions attached to community treatment orders (CTOs) and whether they influence the process of recall to hospital. We conducted a retrospective descriptive survey of the records and associated paperwork of all the CTOs started in the trust in the year from January 2010. Each CTO was followed up for 12 months.

A total of 65 CTOs were included in the study; 25 patients were recalled during the study and all but one of these had their CTO revoked and remained in hospital. Each patient whose CTO was revoked had experienced a relapse in their condition. Many patients had not complied with CTO conditions prior to relapsing and could potentially have been recalled earlier.

Our findings suggest that the breaching of additional CTO conditions does not tend to result in a patient's recall to hospital. This has implications regarding how the workings of CTOs are explained to patients and regarding the utility of additional conditions more generally.

To compare admission rates and bed occupancy before and after the introduction of community treatment orders (CTOs) in 37 assertive outreach service patients. The effect of CTOs on treatment adherence and illicit drug use were also evaluated. The views of patients and care coordinators were obtained through a focus group.

When CTOs were introduced, admission rates fell from 3.3 to 0.3 per year and average bed occupancy declined from 133.2 to 10.8 days per year. Treatment adherence improved from 4 (10.8%) to 31 (83.7%) patients, and an objective reduction in substance misuse was observed in 25 (67.5%) patients. Whereas patients expressed ambivalence towards CTOs, their care coordinators generally had a more positive view.

The decline in hospital usage following the introduction of CTOs is encouraging and could reflect improved adherence and engagement through intensive case management, leading to a reduction in readmissions. However, further studies need to look at quality of life, cost-effectiveness and the impact on patients.

To examine research productivity of staff working across 57 National Health Service (NHS) mental health trusts in England. We examined research productivity between 2010 and 2012, including funded portfolio studies and all research (funded and unfunded).

Across 57 trusts there were 1297 National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) studies in 2011/2012, involving 46140 participants and in the same year staff in these trusts published 1334 articles (an average of only 23.4 per trust per annum). After correcting for trust size and budget, the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust was the most productive. In terms of funded portfolio studies, Manchester Mental Health and Social Care Trust as well as South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust and Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust had the strongest performance in 2011/2012.

Trusts should aim to capitalise on valuable staff resources and expertise and better support and encourage research in the NHS to help improve clinical services.

A clinical audit was used to compare neuroimaging practice in a memory assessment service prior to and 6 months after implementation of guidance, developed from national and European guidelines and adapted to local resource availability, with multislice computed tomography (CT) as first-line structural imaging procedure.

Referrals to the service nearly doubled from the initial audit to the re-audit. Patients having at least one neuroimaging procedure increased from 68 to 76%. Patients with no reason documented for not having imaging significantly reduced from 50% to less than 1%. Despite the larger number of referrals, the mean waiting times for the scans only increased from 22 to 30 days. Variations in practice between the sectors reduced.

Disseminating evidence-based guidelines adapted to local resource availability appears to have standardised neuroimaging practice in a memory assessment service. Further research into the clinical and cost benefits of the increased scanning is planned.

To evaluate the feasibility of integrating a clinical librarian (CL) within four mental health teams. A CL was attached to three clinical teams and the Trustwide Psychology Research and Clinical Governance Structure for 12 months. Requests for evidence syntheses were recorded. The perceived impact of individual evidence summaries on staff activities was evaluated using a brief online questionnaire.

Overall, 82 requests for evidence summaries were received: 50% related to evidence for individual patient care, 23% to generic clinical issues and 27% were on management/corporate topics. In the questionnaires 105 participants indicated that the most common impact on their practice was advice given to colleagues (51 respondents), closely followed by the evidence summaries stimulating new ideas for patient care or treatment (50 respondents).

The integration of a CL into clinical and corporate teams is feasible and perceived as having an impact on staff activities. A CL may be able to collate ‘personalised evidence’ which may enhance individualised healthcare. In some cases the usual concept of a hierarchy of evidence may not easily apply, with case reports providing guidance which may be more applicable than population-based studies.