Council gets ordered to cut delays of mental capacity assessment
(MENAFN) Southampton City Council has been directed to tackle delays in mental capacity assessments after a complaint was upheld by the social care ombudsman.
The council was found at fault following a complaint from a mother regarding an 18-month wait for an assessment of her 18-year-old son. The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman instructed the council to develop an action plan aimed at cutting the long waiting times for both mental capacity assessments and deprivation of liberty safeguards (DoLS) applications.
The council apologized to the mother and confirmed it had reduced the waiting list. It also paid $668 to compensate for the distress, frustration, and uncertainty caused. DoLS are designed to protect vulnerable adults who lack the mental capacity to consent to their care or treatment.
The council’s health overview and scrutiny panel was informed that, in addition to the 18-month delay, there was no record of a visit that the authority claimed to have carried out—both issues were deemed faults by the ombudsman.
Hannah Balzaretti, head of whole life pathway, presented the council’s action plan, noting that in June there were 404 DoLS applications on the waiting list, which has since fallen to 188 new referrals and 113 renewals.
"Those numbers are coming down and that's because we have increased the number of staff that are trained to do the best interests in the DoLS applications. We have increased the number of service managers and team managers that can do the authorisation of those DoLS and through our data we have greater oversight of the throughput," Balzaretti explained.
The council will return to the scrutiny panel in six months to report on progress made under the action plan.
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