A new report has revealed that patients at the Center Amager (formerly Bocentret Sundbygård) mental institution in Copenhagen Municipality are “isolated, lonely and so anxious about attacks from other residents that they rarely leave their immediate living area”.

The report was compiled by Socialtilsyn Hovedstaden, a department under the jurisdiction of Frederiksberg Municipality that oversees residential facilities containing orphans or at-risk/mentally-ill youths and adults in the Greater Copenhagen area.

Too little time
The report contends that its findings are primarily the fault of the hospital’s employees as they do not engage with the patients enough and spend too little time on their needs.

It noted that the staff were so “intensely” busy working on their computers that it “affected [the hospital’s] core function negatively”.

Lonely and sad
Center Amager, which houses 99 patients, will have to respond with suggestions for how “a larger portion of staff resources can be used in engaging in practical work with the residents”, Politiken reported.

Lisbet Jorgensen, whose son has lived at the institution for over 15 years, described the efforts by staff as “insufficient”.

“My experience is that on many days the staff only spend a few minutes with the residents they need to take care of,” she told Politiken.

“The work is insufficient to support the residents getting a better life.”

Her son, she said, is lonely and sad.