Government can't end placement of children in adult psychiatric wards 

A total of 54 children were admitted to adult units last year.

The Government has admitted it is impossible to end the "unacceptable" practice of placing children in adult psychiatric units.

A total of 54 children were admitted to adult units last year with the Mental Health Commission (MHC) saying that young people in crisis are left with the "unacceptable choice" between an emergency department, general hospital or an adult in-patient unit.

Minister of State for Mental Health, Mary Butler has said she is concerned about the number of young people admitted to adult psychiatric facilities but conceded it would be "difficult" to stop completely.

"I'd imagine it would be difficult to go to zero, because we only have three inpatient units in the whole country," she said referring to Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAHMS) units Dublin, Cork and Galway.

Minister of State for Mental Health, Mary Butler has said she is concerned about the number of young people admitted to adult psychiatric facilities.

She agreed there is a lack of inpatient facilities in the north west, midlands and south east but said "it would be next to impossible to have a unit, I've been told, in every geographical location".

Ms Butler said in some cases where an adolescent presents late at night it's not always possible to transfer them to a children's facility while in other cases older teenagers are kept in adult facilities because it is "not always conducive" to put them into units with younger children.

"If somebody is admitted at 11 or 12 at night, it's not always possible to have them transferred overnight, but that decision would obviously be taken from a technical, medical point of view. I would never try to make that decision as a politician. That has to be made from a clinical point of view.

"The other issue as well, is sometimes you can have a young male that will be 17 years of age, and they might be as big as an adult. You could have a 17 year old who's six foot, you know a big, big lad and it's not always conducive to put them into a unit where there might be 12 or 13 year olds who have anorexia, so sometimes they have to weigh up things like that."

However, Ms Butler said that one person in an adult ward is "one too many" and she hopes to see a reduction in those figures.

Ten new beds for Dublin unit

She said 10 new beds will be provided for children in a new unit in Portrane in Co Dublin.

She added: "Sometimes the same person can have multiple admissions so it mightn't be 54 whole people it might be a person admitted two or three times."

However, John Farrelly, chief Executive of the Mental Health Commission, has said: "The placing of children in adult units remains a totally unacceptable, but common feature of mental health care practice in Ireland.” 

An inspection report of the acute psychiatric unit at University Hospital Limerick published earlier this year found that three children were admitted there between November 2018 and June 2019 despite it being an adult approved centre with no programme of activities appropriate to children.