Audit of the NICE Guidelines for Schizophrenia in an NHS forensic psychiatric service

Abstract

The NICE Guidelines for Schizophrenia are designed to give guidance on the best practice in treatment and management of schizophrenia. These guidelines have 13 standards which services can use for the purpose of audit. As schizophrenia is our service's most common diagnosis, an audit against the guidelines was undertaken. The results indicated that we met three of the standards. Recommendations have been implemented to improve practice on standards that were not met, and this has led to some creative practice development. Despite the labour‐intensive nature of the audit, the results gave a clear indication of areas where there was a need for improvement and will act as a good baseline for re‐audit.

Citation

Gough, K., Churchward, S., Dorkins, E., Fee, J., Oxborrow, S., Parker, J. and Smith, H. (2007), "Audit of the NICE Guidelines for Schizophrenia in an NHS forensic psychiatric service", The British Journal of Forensic Practice, Vol. 9 No. 4, pp. 28-34. https://doi.org/10.1108/14636646200700024