Patient Experiences of Patient-Initiated Brief Admission in Psychiatric Care: A Systematic Review.
Emma Värnå, Jonas Nederman, Erika A Saliba-Gustafsson and 1 others
PMID 39462992WHAT IT FOUND
Patients described patient-initiated brief admission as a safety net: a warm welcome, help at any hour and a short break that they said let them keep work, school and relationships.
They also feared unavailable beds and struggled to decide when to ask for admission.
Key findings
01Patients valued a warm welcome and the ability to contact the ward at any hour, which made them feel safer and more willing to cope at home.
02Patients experienced PIBA as a short respite that they said helped them break worsening symptom spirals, prevent self-harm and suicide attempts, and maintain work, school and family roles.
03The experience was undermined when patients could not get a bed, staff lacked knowledge or held negative attitudes, and patients found it hard to judge when admission was needed.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The review reports 186 patients in the results section but 202 patients in the methodological strengths and limitations section, so the participant count is inconsistent. The included studies had low or moderate methodological limitations and were not excluded. The review included only qualitative patient experience studies, so it cannot show whether PIBA works or changes clinical outcomes. The focus on qualitative articles introduces researcher subjectivity and complex data analysis. The included studies came mainly from Northern Europe and Australia, so the findings may not apply elsewhere. The review was not registered.
Declared interests
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this review as proof that PIBA reduces inpatient days or improves clinical outcomes. It synthesises patients' experiences from qualitative studies, and the paper itself notes that some quantitative studies found no significant short-term effects or similar total inpatient days.