Prison doctors likely to resign over army cover

ARMY doctors were drafted in to treat 1,500 prisoners yesterday after a female prisoner attempted suicide and no prompt emergency cover was available.

This unprecedented and "inflammatory" move is likely to prompt the country's 23 striking prison doctors to resign en masse next week.

But the prison service insisted yesterday it had no option but to call in the army doctors because inmates' lives were being put at risk by the prison doctors' strike, now in its third week.

"The last resort was when a female prisoner attempted suicide and the 'bureaucracy' of the strike committee made it extremely difficult to get two doctors to promptly cover this emergency," Prison Services spokesman Jim Mitchell said.

There are currently 1,500 inmates waiting to see a doctor, 50 need detoxification for drug and alcohol conditions and three women at the Dóchas Centre are in urgent need of psychiatric treatment, according to the prison service.

But the Irish Medical Organisation (IMO) yesterday rejected claims it had not provided proper emergency cover for the prisons and insisted its members had at all times responded to requests to commit inmates.

"In light of this unprecedented and inflammatory move by the Irish Prison Service, it is increasingly likely that a decision will be made by the prison doctors to resign en masse from the prison medical services next Wednesday," IMO prison doctors spokesman Dr Hugh Gallagher said.

Prison Services Director Sean Aylward insisted they had failed to secure acceptable emergency cover from the striking doctors and could not leave prisoners in distress anymore.

"Prisoners coming in from court to Cloverhill prison on heroin withdrawal break out into sweats and start getting sick and can even get a fit, but the GPs who are managing the strike cover declined to come in to prescribe a detoxification dose for those prisoners," Mr Aylward said.

There were also mentally unwell prisoners who were delusional and injuring themselves and the prison service could not get doctors to come promptly to certify them so they could be removed to the Central Mental Hospital for treatment, Mr Aylward said.

But the doctors rejected these claims and said they had received few requests for medical treatment.

IMO GP committee chairman Dr Martin Daly, said prisoners who informed staff they needed methadone detoxification had been allowed to go into withdrawal before a doctor was called.

Doctors had also attended to commit patients to the Central Mental Hospital when they had been asked. "But someone who is psychotic and has been seen by a prison doctor can be left in a padded cell for up to two weeks before they are admitted to the Central Mental Hospital," Dr Daly told RTÉ.

The doctors are striking for better resources and pay. "Bringing in the army is only a diversion the main issue is to provide a modern medical service for prisons," Dr Daly added.