Mental Health Isn’t 9 to 5: Why 24/7 Specialist Transport Matters
June 12, 2026
At A Glance
Mental health crises don’t observe office hours, which is why specialist mental health transport must run 24 hours a day, every day of the year.
- Around half of all Section 136 detentions in England happen between 6pm and 6am, when standard ambulance and clinical teams are stretched thinnest.
- Secure 24 dispatch is staffed every hour of every day, with at least one blue-light-trained secure technician per crew.
- Vehicle and crew are matched to the patient’s risk profile by a remote risk assessment before the ambulance leaves base.
- Operating UK-wide for over a decade, with named strongholds in East Surrey, West Sussex, and Hampshire and the Isle of Wight.
- CQC GOOD across all service areas.
A mental health crisis at 3am puts a different set of pressures on a hospital than the same crisis at 11am. The senior clinical decision-makers are at home. The duty AMHP is on call but already covering two boroughs. A&E is full. The bed manager is trying to find an inpatient placement that won’t expire if transport is delayed. The patient is sitting in a corridor or a police vehicle, waiting.
“9 to 5” mental health services aren’t built for that scenario. Specialist mental health transport has to be.
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Call 0330 320 1159 →Why “9 to 5” Doesn’t Work for Mental Health
Acute mental health presentations follow a different rhythm to most healthcare demand. NHS England data on Section 136 detentions consistently shows that the largest share happens in the evening and early hours, with weekends carrying disproportionate volume. Police forces operating under Right Care, Right Person are clearer than ever about when they will and won’t respond. The gap they leave doesn’t wait for daylight.
For NHS trusts and Integrated Care Boards, the operational consequences are familiar. A delayed transfer at 2am means a mental health bed that may not be there at 9am. A crew that can’t be deployed safely from the host hospital means clinical staff sitting in corridors with patients they aren’t trained to manage. A police handover that can’t proceed cleanly means officers off the streets for hours.
Specialist mental health transport that genuinely runs 24/7 isn’t a marketing claim. It’s a workforce model, a fleet model, and a dispatch model that all have to hold up at three in the morning on a bank holiday.
What 24/7 Actually Looks Like Operationally
For Secure 24 a 24/7 service is built on three things working together. We call them the three pillars of mental health transport: expert staff, specialised vehicles, and integrated processes.
Dispatch first. Every call is answered by our control room and triaged with a remote risk assessment before a vehicle is committed. Crew size, vehicle class (Standard, Wheelchair-Accessible, or Cell Secure Ambulance), and equipment are matched to the patient’s risk profile, not to whatever ambulance happens to be free. We don’t upsell. The matching is risk-led.
Crews built for overnight work. Our secure technicians are recruited and onboarded for mental health risk management, not generic patient transport. Every crew includes at least one blue-light-trained member. All crew hold enhanced DBS checks, with child-specific checks for CAMHS work. Training runs through our group partner RISKA on a four-level progressive framework, supported by a monthly team development plan that doesn’t pause overnight or at weekends.
A fleet that holds up at 3am. The Cell Secure Ambulance replaces the dark, barred Category B “cage” still standard in much of the sector with a reinforced Perspex-screened safe space. Climate control inside the safe space, padded reinforced seating, anti-finger-trap door hinges, 360-degree CCTV with audio, live GPS tracking, and on the new fleet adjustable mood lighting. Every detail is there because something on a real overnight job demanded it.
From Dispatch
Note from our Control Room
A 24/7 service is judged on the call that comes in at 4am. By the time the phone rings the patient is usually already in distress, the host team is already stretched, and a delay costs more than time. It costs the bed at the other end. Our job is to take the heat out of the call, build the risk picture in minutes, and put the right vehicle and the right crew on the road. Most of what we do, we do quietly. We measure it in the incidents that didn’t happen.
What Specialist 24/7 Transport Changes for the Pathway
A specialist provider running around the clock changes more than response times. It changes how the rest of the pathway has to work.
When transport is reliable overnight, A&E mental health overflow stops growing into the next morning. When the police handover is clean, officers are back on patrol in twenty minutes rather than four hours. When the AMHP can rely on the conveyancing team rather than directing it, the assessment is calmer for the patient. When the ward at the receiving hospital knows when the patient will arrive, induction onto the ward is paced rather than rushed. Each link the Mental Health Act 1983 Code of Practice describes, from detention through conveyancing to admission, gets shorter and safer.
For the Director of Patient Safety, the operational implications cascade. Section 136 detentions become defensible because the audit trail is intact. Restrictive interventions during conveyance reduce because the safe space replaces prolonged seated restraint. Bed pressure eases because transfers don’t expire. Family complaints drop because the experience is dignified, not custodial.
This is what we mean by the strapline that runs across our fleet: connecting pathways to recovery. Present at every step, particularly the steps that other services don’t cover at 3am.
Inside Our Mental Health Transport Operation
Crew, fleet and dispatch. The people behind every job.
Want to speak to a trust already using Secure 24? We’ll arrange a peer reference call with a Patient Safety or AMHP lead.
Request a reference callWhy Generalist Patient Transport Doesn’t Fill the Gap
The economic logic of standard PTS pushes against 24/7 mental health work. Generalist providers run their fleets on volume and route efficiency. Mental health jobs are unpredictable, single-vehicle, often single-patient, and frequently overnight. They sit awkwardly inside a model designed to move three patients an hour through routine appointments.
The result is the failure pattern most senior NHS leaders have already lived through. Generalist crews dispatched to mental health jobs because targets need to be hit, untrained for de-escalation, paired with vehicles that aren’t equipped for behavioural risk. The transfer goes wrong. The investigation finds the supplier’s training records are thin. The procurement decision becomes the central question.
Specialist providers exist so that question doesn’t have to be answered after the fact. Mental health transport is a discipline. Treating it as an extension of standard PTS, or as a procurement line item, costs more in incidents, staff injury, and patient harm than the savings ever recoup.
Related reading
- Section 135/136 Support: what specialist conveyance looks like under the Mental Health Act
- Ward Assist: the on-ward complement to overnight transport
- Secure Ambulance: vehicle classes, the safe space, and how matching works
- Who Are Secure24?: the three pillars and our CQC record
Secure 24 is our number one provider for transporting our sectioned patients.
The crews treat our patients with care and compassion, and they are meticulous in ensuring all paperwork is accurate and complete.
Bookings are made swiftly and crews keep us updated on ETAs.
Sara Reeve
Logistics Coordinator, East Surrey Hospital Trust
Frequently asked questions
Does Secure 24 actually operate 24/7 or only “most hours”?
Yes, fully 24/7. Dispatch is staffed every hour of every day. We hold capacity for both planned and reactive transfers, with crews available for urgent overnight jobs.What’s the typical response time for an urgent overnight call?
Response varies by region and current load, but our control room takes the call, runs a remote risk assessment, and matches crew and vehicle to the risk profile in minutes. We hold operating strongholds in East Surrey, West Sussex, and Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, with UK-wide coverage beyond.Are your crews trained specifically for mental health work?
Yes. Our secure technicians are recruited for mental health risk management, not generic PTS. Training runs through our group partner RISKA on a four-level progressive framework, with ongoing monthly development. At least one blue-light-trained member sits on every crew. All staff hold enhanced DBS checks; CAMHS work uses child-specific checks.What’s the difference between your Cell Secure Ambulance and the standard “secure” vehicles in the sector?
The standard remains a Category B “cage”, a barred, dark cell-style compartment. Our Cell Secure Ambulance replaces that with a reinforced Perspex-screened safe space: contained but visible, with climate control, padded seating, anti-finger-trap hinges, 360-degree CCTV with audio, and live GPS tracking. The patient is safe. The crew is safe. The audit trail is intact.How do we add Secure 24 to our preferred-supplier list?
Onboarding takes around ten working days: paperwork, induction, dispatch integration, and a sample run-through. We can also discuss a short pilot period if your trust wants operational evidence before a full procurement cycle.Do you have CQC accreditation?
Yes. Secure 24 is CQC-registered and rated GOOD across all service areas. Our inspection record and scope of registration are available on request.Building the business case?
Procurement pack: CQC report, RISKA training framework, fleet specifications, sample SLA.
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