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coping with the increased numbers who have to enter or re-enter
hospital.
This is of course a twenty-four hour service and the night and
weekend work is still undertaken "on call" from home in combination
with the London Boroughs of Lambeth and Southwark.
COMMUNITY CARE OF THE MENTALLY DISORDERED
Co-ordination with hospital services
A major event in the area has been the opening of Oak House,
a hostel for working psychiatric patients, run by Tooting Bec
Hospital in its grounds. The majority of the patients living in the
hostel are Wandsworth residents and each week one of the assistant
principal mental welfare officers meets the social workers and the
warden thus securing the maximum co-ordination for the rehabilitation
of the residents. The warden spent one week in our own
hostel, Chellow Dene, so that our residential staff there could share
their experiences with him. We look forward to even closer cooperation
with the staff of Oak House in the future.
The two assistant principal mental welfare officers continued
their weekly liaison work with West Park and Tooting Bec Hospitals
respectively, and a mental health social worker attended
Queen Mary's Hospital, Carshalton, on a fortnightly basis. The
social work in the three day hospitals in the area, i.e. West Park
and St. George's, Tooting Bec, and Springfield, is carried out by
the mental health social workers, and it has been possible to offer
an increase of two sessions to West Park and St. George's.
The mental health social workers also undertook the social work
for three out-patient clinics at St. James' Hospital, West Park and
St. George's Day Hospital and at the William Harvey Centre.
Facilities for attending conferences at West Park, Tooting Bec
and Queen Mary's Hospitals are offered to the mental health social
workers, who can also attend, as observers, an out-patient clinic for
mentally handicapped children run at St. George's Hospital, where
they are able to observe a consultant psychiatrist's diagnostic and
consultative work.
Chellow Dene Hostel
This hostel for patients who have been psychiatrically ill aims
to rehabilitate them in a supportive community setting. Patients
are admitted either directly from hospital or from the community,
where they may not be functioning adequately, and with the guidance
and assistance of the social workers in the department and the
hostel staff, the majority of those admitted are able to live