Psychiatric patients ‘endangered by system’

MENTAL health experts have called for a line to be drawn in the sand over the inadequate standards of care in certain psychiatric institutions.

The call came after a report warned economic cutbacks, rights breaches, unnecessary use of medication on patients, and the placing of children in adult psychiatric wards are endangering the safety of patients.

In its latest annual report, the Mental Health Commission warned that three years into the HSE’s much-vaunted A Vision for Change reforms for the sector, a series of dangerous oversights are continuing to damage the welfare of the most vulnerable patients in the health service.