Mental health system ‘needs a wake-up call’

THE Irish mental health service is closed and complacent and in dire need of a wake-up call, a major conference on mental health heard yesterday.

The service was categorised as antiquated and far too dependant on medical and hospital intervention by a number of speakers at the International Conference on Mental Health held at University College Cork.

Delegates heard the chairman of the Mental Health Commission, Dr John Owens, castigate the traditional approach to mental health which relied far too much on purely medical responses and hospitalisation.