A survey of publicly funded aged psychiatry services in Australia and New Zealand.

OBJECTIVE

To map the size and distribution of publicly funded aged psychiatry (psychogeriatric) services in Australia and New Zealand in 2003.

METHOD

Services were tracked exhaustively through personal, professional and academic contacts, electronic searches and word-of-mouth. Directors or managers of services were asked to complete a brief questionnaire concerning their locality, services, staff profile and patient contacts.

RESULTS

Services varied widely with respect to their numbers, size and community outreach. Victoria was the only Australian state to provide specialist, multidisciplinary aged psychiatry teams with community, acute inpatient and residential arms in all its major cities. New South Wales, the state with the largest aged population, performed relatively poorly on most indicators. New Zealand performed relatively well despite its small size and widely dispersed population.

CONCLUSIONS

Publicly funded aged mental health services are effective and reach frail, multiply disabled old people who cannot access private psychiatrists and are often overlooked by services for younger adults. At the time of our survey, such services were distributed in Australia in a highly inequitable fashion.