National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission Fact Sheet

Support in the community
Early intervention
Rapid response and treatment
Engaging with carers
What do you think?
More information

People with mental illness should be better supported in the community. One in ten people are estimated to have a long term mental health or behavioural problem.

Support in the community

Early intervention, housing assistance, employment support, education and training can prevent episodes of mental illness and can aid recovery.

Australian communities need a youth-friendly, community-based service that provides information and screening for mental disorders and sexual health - available nationally for all young Australians.

Governments should increase their investment in social support services, particularly vocational rehabilitation and employment support and undertake a national community awareness campaign to increase mental health literacy and reduce the stigma of mental illness.

The states and territories should provide stable housing to people with mental illness, and these should be linked to support services. They should also recognise the compulsory treatment orders of other jurisdictions.

Governments need to develop a strategy to ensure older Australians, including those in aged care facilities, have access to specialty mental health and dementia care services.

Early intervention

An Early Psychosis Prevention and Intervention model should be established for early intervention in psychosis.

Rapid response and treatment

All acute mental health services should have rapid response outreach teams and the capacity to provide appropriate treatment. Hospital-based mental health services should be linked with a multi-disciplinary community-based sub-acute service

Engaging with carers

Consumers and carers should be more involved in the development and refinement of the design and delivery of mental health services.

What do you think?

The Government is undertaking a series of face-to-face consultations and is using this website to seek the views of Australians on these and other options.

What do you think? Tell us at a consultation visit or complete the Tell us what you think form to provide your views.

These views will be compiled and reported to Government prior to deciding what health reform should be undertaken.

Individual responses will not be posted to the views provided on this site.

More information

This is a summary of some of the major recommendations of the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission. Full recommendations can be found in A Healthier Future For All Australians – Final Report of the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission – June 2009