€848,245 paid to nurse child carers

PSYCHIATRIC nurses earned €848,245 in overtime last year caring for two young children at a Co Cork home.

A total of 51 nurses were rostered to care for the two intellectually disabled children in shifts around the clock at the Brothers of Charity home at Lota, Glanmire. On average, each nurse received 16,625 in overtime payments for the period August 2001 to July 2002. However, nursing sources have claimed that some of the psychiatric nurses did considerably more hours than others and they could have earned up to 30,000 each in overtime payments. The Southern Health Board has refused to reveal what the top earners received.

“Many of these psychiatric nurses already had full-time jobs with the Southern Health Board and could only make themselves available outside normal working hours,” a health board spokeswoman said.

The Brothers of Charity, a voluntary organisation, approached the health board to provide and pay for nurses to care for the two children.

The SHB spokeswoman said that although voluntary agencies were responsible for the people using their services, the health board’s primary concern was the well-being of the children needing care and it therefore footed the bill.

A spokeswoman for the Brothers of Charity said as no proper facilities existed in Cork to care for the children, the only other alternative was to send them abroad for treatment, a move which would prove even more expensive. SHB chairman Deputy Batt O’Keeffe said that while a lot of money had been spent on caring for the children, their cases were exceptional. “It is my understanding that there is a shortage of psychiatric nurses.”