Children’s mental health facilities are ‘shameful’

SEVERELY-depressed and suicidal children are spending days on hospital trolleys in A&E wards.

Emergency medicine consultant at the Mater Hospital in Dublin, Dr John McInerney disclosed that, in one case, a severely-disturbed child spent seven days on a trolley because there was no alternative facility.

Hospital consultants have described the matter as “disgraceful”.

Facilities, which such children at risk will soon be legally entitled to, currently do not exist.

Secretary general of the Irish Hospital Consultants Association (IHCA), Finbarr Fitzpatrick, said the situation also led to the wasteful practice of having two specialist nurses looking after the child round the clock.

Psychiatric members of the association said it was “shameful” that with five years to prepare for part two of the Mental Health Act, very little had been done to put in place the facilities and personnel to comply with it. The legislation is due to be implemented in three week’s time.

Psychiatrist, Dr Margo Wrigley, warned that there would be legal consequences if the entitlements of patients who are involuntarily detained in psychiatric hospitals were not met when part two of the act was introduced in three week’s time.

Under the legislation both the local health manager and the clinical director face a custodial sentence of up two years or a fine of up to €5,000 for failing to comply with the legislation.

The psychiatrists are concerned at the lack of sufficient in-patient facilities for children and adolescents and for adults with a learning disability who are detained under the legislation.

They are concerned at the absence of an independent panel of specialists and the failure to appoint 20 extra consultant psychiatrists.

But the Health Service Executive (HSE) said yesterday it was fully committed to implementing the range of necessary supports that would allow for full implementation of the act.

The HSE said it had provided for the development of 22 new consultant-led mental health teams in conjunction with the legislation and had received approval for 14 additional mental health enhancement teams, each with up to three supporting staff.

The health authority pointed out that it had identified additional capacity for the provision on a regional basis of inpatient facilities for children and adolescents who require involuntary admission and said each region would identify three to four beds on an interim basis and provide additional staff training in adult facilities.

Capital funding for four new child and adolescent units had also been allocated and an additional eight teams per year would be rolled out nationally over the next four years to enhance community and inpatient child-adolescent psychiatric services.

The HSE said it was in the process of establishing a panel of consultant psychiatrists who would volunteer to give second opinions under the legislation.

It was working to create additional inpatient capacity for persons with intellectual disability. On an interim basis, the local health manager for each region would work with intellectual and mental health services to identify additional bed capacity at local level.