THE NUMBER of inpatient beds for troubled teenagers in the west is inadequate, a consultant psychiatrist in Clare has claimed.
A specialised 20-bed unit was opened recently by the Health Service Executive (HSE) West in Merlin Park Hospital, Galway.
It aims to provide treatment for adolescents with a wide range of psychiatric problems from nine counties. It replaced a much older facility.
However, Dr Moosajee Bhamjee insisted that at least 50 beds were needed to cover the HSE West area stretching from Donegal to north Tipperary.
Dr Bhamjee said consultants were making inappropriate admissions of teenagers between the ages of 16 and 18 to adult psychiatric wards because of the lack of proper inpatient facilities.
The Mental Health Commission introduced a new code of practice concerning the admission of children into approved mental health centres for adults in July 2009.
According to this code, no child under 16 years should be admitted to an adult psychiatric unit from July 1st, 2009.
Dr Bhamjee said there was no dedicated adolescent psychiatrist in Clare and there was only one in Limerick even though there should be four in the midwest. He said children under 16 with serious psychiatric problems had been admitted to the emergency department in the Mid-Western Regional Hospital, Limerick
A HSE West spokeswoman acknowledged the provision of inpatient acute psychiatric services for children and adolescents had been a significant challenge for a number of years. “The HSE has and is continuing to work with the Mental Health Commission and the Department of Health to ensure that such services are appropriate,” she said.