Nearly 10% of mental health inpatients in Scotland – over 1,300 patients – were readmitted within 28 days of discharge in 2011.

The readmission rate was highest in Dumfries and Galloway at 14%.

Liberal Democrat MSPs used the figures to call for greater investment in community-based mental health services.

“When it comes to mental health, there is no quick fix,” said Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie.

He called on the Scottish Government to “promote tailored community mental health care”, making sure that support was available for patients, families and carers, and ending the cycle of “readmission due to lack of support in the community”.

A Scottish Government spokesman commented that “mental health services should put individuals, families and carers at the centre of care and treatment”.

He added that the new mental health strategy, to be launched later this year, would deliver “increasingly joined-up and systematic mental health services, which enable people to keep well and take responsibility for their mental health”.

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