Violence reduction on older adult mental health wards

The Safer Wards project aimed to increase the safety of patients with mental health needs, specifically tackling the level of violence and aggression on older adult wards in Newham and Hackney, sites covered by our East London mental health trust. We developed a strategy to tackle this issue based on Quality Improvement methods, to better understand the issues underlying the problem, and plan a service improvement that would be feasible within financial and resource constraints. The specific aim of the work was a 20% decrease in violent incidents on the 3 wards in City and Hackney, and Newham