S.TRUEMAN PhD THESIS 2016

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healthcare arena except for remote nurses (Allen Consulting Group. (2010). Their major assistance was well articulated by a remote nurse participant: A police officer is usually [the remote nurses] first choice after—they get them [mental health patients] medicated and then they have somebody [Police Officers] there to help keep them safe. [T17, p. 11] Police often transport and present mental health patients to primary healthcare centres. The reasons for this are many, varied and beyond the scope of this study. The most obvious reason is due to the nature of their duties and the function of their role, which brings them into contact with mental health patients in the community: If we [police] believe that somebody needs to be detained under the Mental Health Act then obviously we … present that person to the clinic and … remote nurses. [T21, p. 6] Mental health community members displaying mental health behaviours or presenting as a danger to themselves or others results in police officers routinely conveying them for assessment and mental healthcare: We don’t have either the resources or the time or the training, really … so we will hand them [mental health patients] over to the [remote nurses]. [T25, p. 7] As an experienced remote police officer stated, such presentations are in accordance with police department policies and procedures: So we [police officers] have to present them [mental health patients] … from our perspective, there is a lot of arse covering that needs to take place as far as policy goes. (T21, p. 17)