Höppner, C.

Informal carers are enormously involved in giving care to their disabled or needy relatives or acquaintances. To care can go along with positive private and health effects. Nevertheless it is proven that informal carers are under a greater risk to suffer from health problems, social isolation and restrictions in professional life. The primary care team can take on a key role by providing support to informal carers. To identify those carers and their burden is essential.

The participation of service users in all aspects of mental health service delivery including policy development, service planning and evaluation is increasingly an expectation of contemporary mental health care. Although there are a growing number of publications reporting service-user perspectives in the evaluation of mental health services, little attention has been paid to the views of service users about mental health triage services.