Its audit of violence found almost 80 per cent of mental health nurses and 36 per cent of service users had either been personally attacked, threatened or made to feel unsafe. Moreover, one third of inpatient staff accept that they or colleagues have threatened to use medication or seclusion to control patients. Then, last year, the Mental Health Commission stated that more than half of England and Wales's psychiatric wards were untherapeutic and unpleasant.

At the heart of the problem lies patient boredom, low staff morale, high staff turnover, mixed sex wards, no gardens or open air environments, drug and alcohol abuse on wards and poor training in the prevention and management of violence.

Although there's no evidence to suggest standards have since improved, there have been – and continue to be – initiatives to push up standards.

For example, The London Development Centre and the Kings Fund were, from 2004-5, involved in a "collaborative" project with 34 inpatients wards across London to boost standards. It claimed to have produced "realistic small changes". Another project, the Star Wards scheme run by the charity Bright, is working with 99 wards around England on networking and "information-sharing" to improve care.

Now mental health professionals have united to try and turn the tide. The Royal College of Psychiatrists, in partnership with the Royal College of Nursing, the British Psychological Society and the College of Occupational Therapists, has launched a national accreditation scheme for inpatient psychiatric wards.

Significantly, organisers say their scheme will have the teeth to both incentivise hospital and ward managers to undertake sustained improvements to their wards, while also promoting a national sharing of good practice between staff.

The Accreditation for Acute Inpatient Mental Health Services (AIMS) assesses wards on more than 100 standards, covering everything from a ward's physical environment, staff support and training, to patient advocacy provision, to making sure that on the day a patient is admitted and well enough they are notified who their primary nurse is, and how to arrange to meet with them.

Its data is based on anonymous feedback and opinions from staff, patients and carers, combined with a site visit by AIMS peer-reviewers. These peers then produce a report and, if standards are judged to be satisfactory, accreditation is awarded. The four-tiered accreditation means wards will be, at best, "excellent" and, at worse, "a significant threat to patient safety, rights or dignity and/or would breach the law." The four levels are "accredited with excellence", "accredited", "accreditation deferred" and "not accredited"

After a pilot involving 16 wards, 57 wards have now signed up to AIMS, with 10 wards having already received accreditation.

Importantly, Dr Paul Lelliott, director of the Royal College of Psychiatrists' research and training unit which oversees AIMS, says that staff, when assessing their own wards, are candid. "Staff are being brutally honest," says Lelliot. "Staff in the front line are motivated to tell how it is. They do not have the same pressure as people higher up the organisation who have to tick boxes and meet targets. They are refreshingly honest."

Mind, which runs a campaign aiming to improve psychiatric wards, backs AIMS. Its policy officer, Emily Wooster, does, however, have one reservation. She has closely examined the standards (decided upon by a AIMS steering group), and feels they lean more towards assessing safety and risk management than creating a therapeutic environment. "Safety is clearly a priority with the [AIMS] document, and we not want to see an emphasis on risk that will over-ride all the other important aspects," she says.

AIMS is also not mandatory. Wards choose whether or not to pay AIMS the £1,600 to participate, and then, if they gain accreditation the £5,760 to see their accreditation through for four years. There are therefore concerns that of the 500 inpatient psychiatric wards in England, Wales, Ireland and northern Ireland that AIMS wants to reach, only top-end wards will participate. Poor wards might not want to.

Marion Janner, a service user who set up Star Wards and serves on AIMS' steering group, recognises this limitation. "Those wards that do [participate in AIMS] are those wards which function well anyway. The challenge will be to get enough wards to take up AIMS," she says. "Standards are only standards – they are not enough. The challenge is to help poor wards achieve those standards."

To this end, AIMS is promoting the Star Wards scheme, and Tanner is adamant that poor wards can make radical changes at "virtually no cost". For Janner, it is ward managers (responsible for heading new initiatives) and healthcare assistants (who have the most everyday patient contact) who are key to bringing about change on wards. "Something needs to happen to inspire and staff to provide a much better service," she says.

Lelliot adds that he believes AIMS can boost standards across the board because he believes the Healthcare Commission will encourage wards to participate in AIMS. "In its review of inpatient acute wards, which the commission is presently working on, they [commissioners] will enquire whether wards are participating in AIMS," says Lelliot.

Lelliot also highlights the Royal College of Psychiatrists' accreditation scheme for ECT clinics. He says this scheme, which 90 clinics have participated in, has driven up national standards. He hopes AIMS will result in a similar upward quality trend for psychiatric wards. "Some ECT clinics which have failed have been subsequently closed down, or they have merged with other better ECT clinics. We have found that management takes very decisive action," says Lelliot.