Drug Interventions Programme

Back to Throughcare & Aftercare

Mental health

SCAN Consensus Project - substance misusing clients with mental health problems: a brief practitioner’s guide for Criminal Justice Integrated Teams.

The SCAN Consensus Project guide has been designed specifically for staff in Criminal Justice Integrated Teams (CJITs) but it may also be useful to other service providers.

Staff in these services see many clients who have both substance misuse and mental health problems (also known as co-morbidity or dual diagnosis). While it is not the core role of CJITs to manage or treat the mental health element of a client’s mental health problems, it is important to be able to recognise and refer clients with these problems to appropriate care and with the appropriate degree of urgency.

Practical guide

This practice paper is intended to be a step-by-step practical guide on how to identify, assess and refer substance misusers with co-occurring mental health problems to relevant services. It should provide sufficient information to inform the decision making of CJIT staff but should not be seen as a comprehensive guide on mental health and further reading and information is referenced.

The guide includes a template for CJITs to record relevant local contacts who can advise on, or accept urgent and non-urgent referrals of clients with co-occurring mental health problems. This information can help to ensure appropriate access for all CJIT staff to information on the local services to support their effective and efficient liaison in everyday practice. Local partnerships including the Drug Action Team (DAT) and the substance misuse treatment system in general will continue to have a vital role in supporting CJITs, primary care teams and community mental health teams in addressing the needs of this client group.

A Word version of the CJIT template can also be downloaded separately from the SCAN website (new window).

What is SCAN?

The Specialist Clinical Addiction Network (SCAN) was commissioned in 2003 by the Department of Health to provide support and resources to psychiatrists who specialise in the treatment of addiction. Among other resources and projects, SCAN produces a quarterly newsletter, SCANbites, two annual conferences (in September for addiction specialists and, in June, for trainees and new consultants in addiction psychiatry) and a website. SCAN is jointly supported by the National Treatment Agency for Substance Misuse, Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Department of Health. 

For more information please contact the Aftercare Team.