‘Fantastic’ mental health unit built with calm in mind at CUH

“If you were ever in GF, you’d appreciate how fantastic this new unit is.”

So said the HSE staff conducting the media tour of the new state-of-the-art mental health unit at Cork University Hospital (CUH).

Fortunately for me, I’ve never had a brush with GF, but the name alone — based, with a singular lack of imagination, on its ‘ground floor’ location — is chronically uninspiring.

Located on the CUH campus since 1979, it’s been the subject of repeated criticism by the Mental Health Commission, not least for its “generally unsatisfactory structural nature for modern acute care”.

Now though, all is changed, changed utterly, and not just the name.

The purpose-built 50-bed South Lee Mental Health Services Unit (SLMHSU) on the CUH campus is airy, bright, roomy, and full of nuanced design features, from broad corridors with bevelled walls to negate the “straight line” look, to seven nicely landscaped outdoor interior garden spaces, to a “wander loop” for elderly patients whose diminished hold on reality can send them wandering without realising where they are.

The loop also encompasses a garden space and, because security is paramount, it is surrounded by glass. In fact, glass is a feature throughout the building, including at the ends of corridors, creating a sense of continuous flow, which helps in reducing any sense of claustrophobia, says Mental Health Minister Kathleen Lynch.

In the en suite patient bedrooms — male and female are at opposite sides of the unit — great care has been taken to ensure there are no ligature points, with slant-top doors and no projecting door handles, window handles, or curtain rails. Low-level lighting — just above skirting board level — means patients are not disturbed at night and each bedroom door is fitted with a glass panel which can be adjusted to opaque or transparent from both inside and out, useful for observation without entering a room. Both male and female sides of the building have nurse observation stations.

Bedrooms are not equipped with individual TVs — to discourage patients turning them into a “home from home”, which is not conducive to the recovery process, says Ned Kelly, area director of nursing for SLMHS. But there are TVs in some of the rest rooms and in each eight bedroom on the second floor for patients over 65. These rooms are also equipped with hoists which run along rails fitted in the ceiling to assist in transporting elderly patients to the bathroom, when required. Both floors have a dining area, for the sake of privacy and dignity of patients on both floors. Food will come from the kitchens in CUH.

The ground floor has assessment rooms, and glass-fronted visiting rooms, again for security and brightness, and there is underfloor heating throughout.

There’s also plenty of space for staff showers and locker rooms; there are offices for administration, consulting rooms, a room for the multidisciplinary team to meet, and therapy rooms. There’s even provision for the holding of Mental Health Tribunals, where, under law, patients detained involuntarily can appeal their detention within 21 days. Mr Kelly says the aim is one of the two two-bed rooms on the ground floor can be used for mothers and babies, perhaps to treat postnatal depression.

Greta Crowley, operations manager for mental health services in HSE Cork and Kerry, says the unit will have 56 full-time equivalent staff, 10 more than they have now, and four additional beds. The unit, in the pipeline since 2009, cost €15m to build and was completed in 18 months and on time.

“We are delighted. There is an entirely different feel to this unit. It’s out on the campus, not trying to hide, as has been the case with mental health. We are focused on getting rid of the stigma,” Greta says. The unit is due to open in the next 10 days.