Mental health services must improve at 127 NHS groups, figures show

More than half of mental health services at local NHS groups require improvement, new figures show.

Of 209 Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), 106 "need improvement", while 21 have the "greatest need for improvement", according to NHS England.

Thirteen were marked as "top performing", with 69 classed as "performing well".

Professor Tim Kendall, NHS England's national clinical director for mental health, said "significant work" was needed but a five-year plan would help more than one million extra people by 2020/21.

Chief executive Simon Stevens said the level of transparency in released data was "unprecedented for any mental health service anywhere in the world".

Mental health provision was assessed in two areas - the number of people moving to recovery following treatment, and those treated within two weeks of referral after a first episode of psychosis.

Professor Kendall said: "NHS England has launched the first national standards to increase access to evidence-based mental health services which will kick-start the transformation needed to achieve our ambitions for the next five years.

"We know that performance has improved in recent months meaning that people are already getting better access to services and recovery rates are rising across the country."

The data will help CCGs "self-assess more effectively" with a "comprehensive support package" available to those who need it, NHS England said.

Mr Stevens said: "These figures for last year transparently lay out the starting baseline against which everyone will be able to judge whether the NHS is getting better in each and every town, city and county across England."