Danny Healy-Rae urges more mental-health services in Kerry
Danny Healy-Rae spoke about suicide and mental-health services, urging increased resources in Kerry and adherence to best-practice care. He argued that facilities and specialist staff are inadequate and appealed to the minister and the HSE to act.
Inspectorate findings
The national survey from the Office of the Inspector of Mental Health Services, he said, found that international best practice is not available in most departments in Ireland, highlighting systemic shortfalls in care.
Local shortages in Kerry
He said Kerry does not have enough facilities to deal with demand, pointing to pressure in South Kerry camps and North Kerry camps and describing that situation as only the tip of the iceberg.
Personal intervention recounted
He recounted a 2016 case of a young man threatening suicide whose family were at their wits' end. After persistent contact a senior nurse kept the young man in hospital for three weeks and he is "perfect today," the speaker said, using the example to underline what timely care can achieve.
Calls for services and staff
He appealed directly to the minister and urged the HSE to increase local services, arguing emergency departments are not the right place for young people in crisis and calling for separate rooms, more psychiatrists and more psychologists to address addiction, hereditary issues and intense pressure on students.
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Thank you very much. I'm glad to get the opportunity to talk about this very important issue and I'm glad that Sinn Féin isn't brought forward here this evening. Every one of us know a lot of people that have committed suicide and it is very sad when we lose very fine people that way. And we'd all love to do a whole lot more for them and we do need to do more because the national survey from the Office of the Inspector of Mental Health Services which has found that international best practice is not available in most departments in Ireland. I can honestly say, Minister, we don't have enough facilities in Kerry to deal with the amount of people that have problems, young people, and see what happened with the South Kerry camps and indeed North Kerry camps. And that's just the tip of the iceberg but I was only up here a very short time in 2016 when I got a call from a family, a young family, brothers and sisters of a young boy that was threatening to commit suicide. His father. His father had did it five or six years before that and they were up day and night with him and they had him in a certain hospital at this time and the hospital would leave him going home and they were dreading the weekend to see how they'd mind him for the weekend and another weekend again. And I rang the hospital and I rang the hospital and I'm very glad that a senior nurse came on the phone to me and she promised she'd see after him and she kept him for three weeks in that hospital and he's perfect today and I'm glad that if I never done anything else in my life but we're not able to do it for enough of people. And I'm glad that Mary Butler said she was going to, when she spoke earlier here, that she was going to increase services in Kerry. By God, we certainly need them and I'm appealing to her to get hold of the HSE and ensure that happens. And I hear many other deputies talking here about that all the emergency departments are not the place. Certainly they're not. We should have a separate, a separate room for people to deal with these young people. They're often young people when they go in and they have troubles maybe from different things and maybe addiction or whatever. They have trouble. There's savage pressure on youngsters now going to college and trying to compete and trying to stay in education and maybe have to find their path. Which way they want to go and there's so much that we could do and we need, we certainly need more psychiatrists but we certainly need psychologists as well to talk to them. And to understand because there's only people like them can understand the problems that they have. Some of it can be hereditary. It has been in families. We know that. But look, we're all united here together that the services must be enhanced. They must be increased. And we must help these lovely young people and people who often leave desert too soon. And we've all been at funerals. We know the trauma that it leaves behind in families. It's serious. And we have to do more. Thank you.
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