Dorset Approved Mental Health Professional Service

Approved Mental Health Professional (AMHP)

An AMHP will have had extensive specialist training and can be:

• a social worker
• a mental health or learning disability nurse
• an occupational therapist or
• a chartered psychologist

 Their many responsibilities include:

• facilitating community care options if a person does not require hospital admission
• playing a key part when people are compulsorily admitted and detained in a psychiatric hospital under the Mental Health Act
• organising the Mental Health Act assessment
• facilitating conveyance if required
• upholding the law

The Dorset AMHP Service Hub (DASH)

The Dorset AMHP Service Hub (DASH):

• considers requests to carry out work related to the Mental Health Act
• manages out of hours social care calls over night
• operates twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year

A person may need support from the DASH team in relation to their mental health if:

• there is an acute deterioration in their mental health; or
• there is a gradual decline over a longer period which has reached a critical point; and
• the person or those around them are at significant risk of harm as a result of their current mental health needs

Contacts