It is well recognised that providing good care to psychiatric patients requires a variety of services organised into a comprehensive and coordinated system. The keystone element of that system is an effective response to a psychiatric crisis.

Not that long ago, the response to a psychiatric crisis was doing an evaluation and making a disposition. Depending on the severity of the crisis, the disposition was either an appointment to an outpatient clinic or hospitalisation. The result was inadequate and patients did not get the help they needed, leading to high hospital admission rates, frequent readmissions and suffering by both patients and their families.

This volume chronicles a revolutionary change to responding to a psychiatric crisis: the introduction of the ‘crisis resolution team’ (CRT). The goal of the CRT is to resolve the crisis and this includes not only assessing the patient but also developing a treatment plan and delivering the services to the patient's home until the patient is stabilised. The team then takes on the responsibility for ensuring that the patient is transferred to the appropriate service for further care.

As a result of the NHS Plan in 2000, there has been a rapid and wide implementation of these teams. This much-needed book fills a gap in the available literature in this area and will be of immense help to both the clinician and the researcher.