Survey of stakeholders’ opinions of community psychiatric nursing services

The paper describes a telephone survey of the views of representatives of users, purchasers and providers of community psychiatric nursing services on services in Scotland. The telephone interview protocol was based on seven themes derived from interviewing 63 users, purchasers and providers throughout the UK. Descriptive statistics were used to present the responses in the survey to the forced choice questions. Responses to the open ended questions were coded, categorized and computed. The paper describes the responses by the major stakeholders to each of the themes. Overall, the quality of the existing services was placed in the 'good' category. However, criticism was directed at the insufficient numbers of Community Psychiatric Nurses in the service, the inadequate amount of time spent with clients and their poorly organized method of working. Other findings and stakeholders' recommendations are discussed.