Lousia Ovington independent investigation report ... - NHS North East

Kneesworth House
Louisa Ovington continued to use the defences of denial and avoidance when she
moved on to Kneesworth House. As Assistant Psychologist 2 told the panel, “She was
highly defensive, which meant any interviewing with her was problematic,, whether
you were experienced or inexperienced”.
Whilst at Kneesworth House, Louisa Ovington had six assessment psychology sessions
with a ‘consultant psychologist and integrative psychotherapist’, during some of
which she allowed some exploration of her background history. However, despite
the fact that issues to do with her mother’s death and her relationship with her father
were noted, it was not thought appropriate to offer her psychotherapy, because she
was very guarded and unwilling to explore issues in detail. The consultant passed
the case over to an unqualified, “assistant psychologist” who attempted to work on
relapse prevention in terms of Louisa Ovington’s drug use and on supporting her in
monitoring her mental state when her mood stabilising medication was stopped.
COMMENT
CHAPTER 2 – EVALUATION OF THE HEALTH CARE AND TREATMENT OF
LOUISA OVINGTON
The opinion that Louisa Ovington was not ready to engage with psychotherapy
concurred with the view of the staff from St Nicholas’. Psychologist 1 had described
Louisa Ovington as being at the very early stages of a change process. She had not
reached the point where active work could be done on her difficulties. Thus, she
would simply have been unable to use psychotherapy. It appears that Louisa Ovington
had made no progress in this direction during her time at Kneesworth House. This may
simply be a reflection of the extensive amount of time that would have been required
for this to happen, but the panel found no evidence in the notes from Kneesworth
House of the use of any interventions to try to move her forward in this way.
It seemed inappropriate to the panel for Louisa Ovington’s case to be passed over
to such an inexperienced member of staff as the assistant psychologist, particularly
given how “very walled off” Louisa Ovington was and how challenging she found the
sessions to be.
Louisa Ovington completed a self-reported Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI)
in what her then consultant psychiatrist subsequently described as an “almost
provocative” way, denying for example that she had difficulties in controlling her
impulses. The panel was told that the results of the PAI were interpreted by a clinical
psychologist. The PAI conclusions noted her “substantially lower than typical interest
in and motivation for treatment”. The PAI also noted that diagnoses that should
be considered included “psychoactive substance abuse” and “antisocial personality
disorder”. This was apparently the sole psychometric assessment of personality used
as there are no other such assessments in the records.
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