A RETIRED professional football player took his own life two days after being sent home from hospital because no psychiatric beds were available anywhere in Northern Ireland, an inquest heard today.
Steven McAdam (43) was assessed in a hospital emergency department as being a danger to himself but his family were told "take him home and don't leave him alone".
They followed these instructions, but less than 48 hours later Mr McAdam slipped out of the back door of his home in Bangor, Co Down and killed himself.
Mr McAdam, who had played for Portadown in the Irish League and then English league club Burnley, became increasingly depressed as a health condition made him more disabled and reliant on his family.
Even before he drove into the water on Saturday, February 21st, 2004, his brother had noticed Mr McAdam had given him the slip, raised the alarm with police and started a search fearing the worst.
The inquest heard Mr McAdam had threatened previously to take his life.
He told his family on that occasion he couldn't go through with it because of his love for his wife and two children.
His family blame the health service for his death for not providing the psychiatric care they say he needed.
Northern Ireland senior coroner John Leckey said at the opening of the inquest at Belfast Coroner's Court he had no doubt Mr McAdam took his own life, but he had a series of questions that needed answering.
Mr Leckey said he wanted to know if admission to a psychiatric unit had been based on need or availability - whether he could have been sectioned, and if not why not, and whether such a move would have made a bed available.
Was Plan B - discharge into the care of his family - always the fall-back position, asked Mr Leckey.
He added: "Is it fair to expect a family to assume responsibility for the wellbeing of someone such as Steven who has expressed suicidal thoughts and has been assessed as requiring admission to a psychiatric unit?
"What would have happened if the family refused to accept such responsibility?"
The coroner added: "Whilst measures may be put in place to reduce the risk of a person taking their own life, it is impossible to remove the risk altogether.
"A person determined to take their own life will always find a way, regardless of what has been done to prevent that."
Mr McAdam's sister-in-law, Cathy McAdam, was with him when he was refused a bed.
She said with hindsight she would have wrecked the casualty department at the Craigavon hospital to get attention.
She said her advice to others was "don't be polite, don't be nice because it gets you nowhere".
Mrs McAdam added: "I went into shell-shock when I was told there was no bed, especially when Dr Moore wrote down on his notes he was a risk to himself and required admission - I expected nothing more than that he would be admitted."
Mrs McAdam, who works as a community officer for the Craigavon Health Trust, said Mr McAdam's wife and another sister-in-law - a paediatric nurse in the same hospital - had left the casualty department earlier, certain he was being admitted. - (PA)