The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners
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Increasing numbers of long-term mentally ill people now live in the community, many of whom lose contact with psychiatric services and come to depend on general practitioners for medical care. However, it has been suggested that general practitioners may be unaware of some of these patients and their needs. ⋯ These findings suggest that patients in long-term contact with specialist services cannot be taken as representative of the whole population with long-term mental illness. General practitioners could use their frequent contacts with long-term mentally ill people to play a greater role in monitoring the mental state and drug treatment of this group.