Top doctors slammed mental a region’s health services as unsafe after 13 suicides since 2012. Consultants wrote to the mental health minister slamming local services in Carlow, Kilkenny and South Tipperary for ignoring their concerns. In their letter to Labour’s Kathleen Lynch, the doctors called for a probe into nine deaths in HSE services between August 2011 and January 2013, which include eight suicides. In the letter which was written this time last year, they said they felt “devalued” and “ignored” when they quizzed the safety of State services. HSE bosses said the consultants’ concerns had been addressed, but Opposition TDs blasted Ireland’s mental health service as “broken”. Fianna Fail’s spokesman on mental health Colm Keaveney said the “harrowing” revelations should serve as a wake-up call. He added: “The fact that nine prominent consultant psychiatrists in that area have written to minister Lynch saying they have no faith in the system is extremely worrying. “If the patrons of the system have no faith in it, then what hope is there for the service users?” Mrs Lynch has been accused of ignoring doctors’ warnings that mental health services are at breaking point and refusing to meet frontline staff. Mr Keaveney said: “She claims the service in Carlow, Kilkenny and South Tipperary is the best resourced in the country, so why are suicide and self-harm numbers so high? “The system is not working and it must be changed to meet the needs of users. The only way this can be done is speaking with nurses, doctors and patients. For so long, the State presided over the mistreatment and abuse of our most vulnerable citizens.” The letter obtained under the Freedom of Information Act said doctors were concerned about three suicides by in-patients, four at home and a further suicide in a crisis house between 2011 and 2013. The consultants called on minister Lynch to intervene with the HSE to review the findings. But an official briefing document prepared for the minister in response to the doctors’ outrage said the death toll is not out of line with figures from the previous 11 years. Talking to RTE’s This Week, retired consultant Alan Moore said the hospital suicides are still unusually high. An investigation has now been launched by the Irish Mental Health Commission into how the services are run, along with a review by the National Lead Clinical Director’s Programme.
Posted on: Wed, 25 Jun 2014 17:25:02 +0000
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