A new report, Mental health services in Australia
2004-05, released today by the Australian Institute of Health
and Welfare shows that 10.8% of all encounters with general
practitioners (GPs) in 2004-05 were for the management of mental
health problems -- equivalent to an average of one such encounter
for every two Australians.
'About 60% of those GP encounters were by females and almost 34%
were for depression', said Jenny Hargreaves, Senior Executive in
the Institute's Economics and Health Services Group.
The report describes many aspects of mental health-related
services in Australia including their provision, where they were
accessed, and the resources used in their delivery.
'It shows that males made up 53.5% of the over five million
service contacts with public community mental health services and
hospital outpatient services provided in 2004-05, and schizophrenia
was the most common (39.9%) principal diagnosis reported.' Ms
Hargreaves said.
About 80% of the estimated 199,353 mental health-related
separations for admitted patients were from public hospitals and
more than half (58.6%) involved specialised psychiatric care.
There were 2,194 episodes of care involving overnight stays
provided by residential mental health facilities during
2004-05.
In 2005-06 Medicare funded over two million psychiatrist services,
an average of 98.6 per 1,000 people in Australia, at a cost to the
Government of $221 million.
There were also 20.7 million claims processed for pharmaceutical
benefits in respect of mental health-related medications. Between
2000-01 and 2005-06, the number of scripts processed increased at
2.2% per year with the greatest increase for antipsychotics and
antidepressants (6.8% and 4.6% per year, respectively).
In 2004-05, there were 20 public psychiatric hospitals providing
an average of 2,487 beds per day, with estimated expenditures
totalling $528 million. A further 122 public acute hospitals had
psychiatric wards or units providing an average of 3,450 beds.
In addition, 26 private hospitals provided 1,512 beds at an
estimated expenditure of $168 million in 2004-05.
Government community and residential mental health facilities
provided 1,226 beds in 2004-05, at a total expenditure of $985
million.
27 April 2007
Further information: Ms Jenny Hargreaves, AIHW,
tel. 61 2 6244 1121, mob. 0407 012 520
For media copies of the report: Publications
Officer, AIHW, tel. 61 2 6244 1032.
Availability: Check the AIHW Publications
Catalogue for availability of Mental health
services Australia 2004-05