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Is the role of regional secure units changing?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2018

Jeanette Smith
Affiliation:
The Butler Clinic, Langdon Hospital, Exeter Road, Dawlish, Devon EX1 0NR
Julian Parker
Affiliation:
The Butler Clinic
Martin Donovan
Affiliation:
The Butler Clinic
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Regional secure units are a relatively new facility for the treatment of mentally disordered offenders and difficult to manage patients. Their role is still evolving. Previous studies have described details of referrals and admissions to such secure units (Higgins, 1981; Gudjonsson & Mackeith, 1983; Offen & Taylor, 1985; Faulk & Taylor, 1986; Bullard & Bond, 1988). To date, however, no studies have examined changes of practice in RSUs over time. The purpose of the present study is to examine changes in the admission characteristics of patients admitted to the Butler Clinic, regional secure unit for Devon and Cornwall since it opened in 1983 to the present time.

Type
Articles
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1990

References

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Smith, J. E., Parker, J. & Donovan, W. M. (1991) Female admissions to a regional secure unit. The Journal of Forensic Psychiatry (in press).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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