HEALTH AUTHORITIES have yet to finalise plans on where to accommodate more than 1,000 urgent psychiatric admissions after they were ordered to cease taking new patients into sub-standard mental hospitals.
The Mental Health Commission last week announced it had ordered that admissions to three hospitals – St Brendan’s in Grangegorman, St Ita’s in Portrane and St Senan’s in Enniscorthy – should cease due to “inhumane” conditions. They are due to stop accepting patients in the coming months.
While acute admissions to St Brendan’s will move to a new unit in Blanchardstown shortly, it could take a number of years before new facilities are ready to accept admissions from St Ita’s and St Senan’s hospitals.
St Ita’s has around 800 acute admissions a year, while St Senan’s has around 660, a combined total of 1,460 admissions.
Martin Rogan, the Health Service Executive’s assistant national director of mental health services, said it was examining a number of options for acute admissions.
“We’re working with the Mental Health Commission to see what we can do,” he said.
“We have a statutory requirement to admit patients in need of care to approved centres and that is what we will do. We are having intensive engagement over what is realistic, what the timelines are.”
St Senan’s has been told to stop acute admissions to two units by February next year. It must also meet full compliance with rules on seclusion and mechanical body restraints by September.
Among the options being examined are sending new admissions to Waterford Regional Hospital’s acute unit and developing community mental health services.
However, mental health campaigners claim the 44-bed acute unit in Waterford is already operating close to capacity and will not be able to absorb the numbers from Wexford.
St Ita’s in Dublin has also been told to halt acute admissions by next February and to close two other units by this November.
There are plans to move acute admissions to a new 60-bed facility in Beaumont Hospital. However, this will not be ready until early in 2012 at the earliest, according to the HSE.
There is less pressure on finding accommodation for acute patients who are admitted to St Brendan’s in Grangegorman. Mr Rogan said a new unit would open in the Connolly hospital in Blanchardstown next month.
Dr Siobhán Barry of the College of Psychiatry of Ireland said professionals had major concerns over the lack of adequate provision for people in need of acute inpatient services. She said closing facilities without setting up alternatives was placing often helpless and vulnerable citizens at real risk.
Minister of State with responsibility for mental health John Moloney said yesterday he accepted progress towards a modern community-based mental health service was too slow.
But he said resources were being targeted towards new developments that would allow for the closure of outdated psychiatric hospitals like St Ita’s and St Senan’s.
“The pace of change can be frustrating, I accept that, but there are capital funds to build modern, new facilities which will meet the needs of patients,” he said.
He was referring to a plan to raise €50 million through the sale of psychiatric land and assets, which will be reinvested in new mental health facilities.
Mr Moloney said he hoped the remaining 14 Victorian-era institutions would be closed in the next three years and replaced by modern, community-based facilities.
Last week’s Inspector of Mental Health Services report raised concern at how mental health budgets had been raided in recent years.
Mr Moloney insisted this would not happen again, following a Government commitment to ring-fence psychiatric funds.