"Poor level of care in psych ward"

I felt the care received at Box Hill was beyond explanation. In my opinion, it was awful! The level of negligence towards the patients there was, I felt, almost a joke.

I stayed at this hospital for a week due to suicide and other mental health issues and I felt the level of care I received was almost non-existent. I saw a physiologist once my whole admission and the kids in this ward are just let to roam free if you will, reminding me almost of a school camp. I would pace laps/run up and down the halls to burn off calories after eating almost nothing at meal times (which were not monitored) and with all of this I believe they were aware that I had been diagnosed with an eating disorder.

Whilst my stay, I also began to engage in newly learned behaviours such as purging and head banging which I had never engaged in before Box Hill. I believe this was due to the lack of surveillance and the lack of care from majority of the staff (did they not notice that we had fresh self-harm marks when they would do checks). In addition to this, there would be nights where staff came around to do checks and I believe a patient would be sitting there and crying or engaging in over exercise and even then, I believe no help or even a simple check-in was done.

Overall, I feel the hospital did do some good things and some nurses and staff were really helpful however, in my opinion, the level of care was not where it should be. And because this is a psychiatric hospital for young people, I believe the level of care was not enough.