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Dáil
‹ Questions on Promised Legislation

Sligo CAMHS staffing crisis

Summary

Deputy Martin Kenny described severe disruption in Sligo CAMHS after the resignation of the senior child psychiatrist and a large backlog for children needing mental health care. The Taoiseach said he could not explain the resignations but would ask the HSE and Minister to respond, acknowledging the seriousness of the situation.

On Monday morning, I met a group of parents of children with various disabilities to discuss child and adult mental health services, CAMHS, in Sligo. Last week, the senior child psychiatrist resigned. She had only been in the position for four months and I think her predecessor was in the position for even a shorter period. There has been chopping and changing for the past two years. There is a huge backlog of children who have serious problems and their parents are absolutely out of their minds. It reminded me of the television programme, "Living on the List"; it was a similar kind of situation. These families are very worried. Their children are waiting for months on end to be assessed. Then, when recommendations are made that services be put forward for them, they find the psychologist, speech therapist or OTs are not in place to provide those services. It is a crisis in the Sligo-Leitrim area. It is not that one child psychiatrist needs to be recruited; two need to be recruited to deal with the backlog. One parent told me how she had to hide the knives and cutlery in the house-----

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I thank the Deputy.

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-----to stop her child self-harming. It is a very serious situation-----

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I thank the Deputy.

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-----and the Taoiseach's Government needs to take a handle on it and sort it out-----

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The Deputy's time is up.

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-----because we are looking at a situation that will be a catastrophe if not resolved shortly.

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Enda Kenny The Taoiseach Fine Gael

I cannot answer Deputy Kenny as to why the psychologist and her predecessor retired or resigned. There are reasons that apply locally. However, I will have the HSE and the Minister respond to Deputy Kenny about this. I do not have all the detail of all the issues such as this that get raised locally, but it is important for the people there, the parents and children, that these matters be dealt with and sorted out.

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