CONFUSION OVER OPENING OF MENTAL HEALTH UNIT
HSE SAYS 40-BED MENTAL HEALTH UNIT WILL OPEN BY MARCH AS UNIONS BRAND TIMEFRAME ‘UNREALISTIC’
THE 40-bed mental health unit of Deer Lodge in Killarney, which has been lying idle for two years since its completion, will open in a matter of weeks according to Kerry Sinn Féin TD Martin Ferris.
Deputy Ferris says it was ‘confirmed’ to him on Monday that the long-awaited unit would finally be opened within a matter of weeks.
HSE regional manager Ger Reaney told elected representatives at the Regional Health Forum on Thursday the facility would be open by March.
Mr Reaney’s assurance flies in the face of the latest from mental health nurses’ union the Psychatric Nurses’ Association (PNA) who say that negotiations over the staffing of the unit are far from resolved, however.
In a statement this week, PNA spokesperson Cormac Williams said that the timeframe of June to September 2017 was a much more realistic one for the opening of Deer Lodge.
Fianna Fáil County Councillor John Joe Culloty was meanwhile informed at a meeting of the southwestern health forum on Thursday that the project team is ‘working hard’ to open the unit ‘as soon as possible’.
No specific date was furnished by Culloty in response to his direct question ‘when is it expected that Deer Lodge in Killarney will open?’
Deputy Ferris has meanwhile warned that an acute four-bed facility at University Hospital Kerry (UHK) also lying complete but idle will not now open until next year in another area of huge concern for mental health services in the county.
Two phsyciatric nurse unions - SIPTU and the PNA - are now threatening industrial action as Deer Lodge remains closed and their members remain deployed in the Cluain Fhionnain service for adults with intellectual disabilities in Ballydribeen Killarney.
SIPTU has given the HSE a deadline of May 31 to redeploy its member nurses into the mental health service. This week, the PNA said that any move to open Deer Lodge without an agreement on staffing would result in a ‘ boycott’ and picket at the facility by the PNA.
“The PNA believes this [March] is a totally unrealistic time fame for the opening of Deer Lodge. A realistic time line for it’s opening is June to September 2017, as there are two hurdles to clear to allow for the open of Deer Lodge,” Mr Williams said.
Cluain Fhionnain will have to be taken over by intellectual disability service providers first and its 26 mental health nurses redeployed; and a change in the proposed ratio of healthcare assistant to mental health nurse - 1/3 HCA to 2/3 nursing suggested by the HSE at present and deemed ‘unacceptable’ by the PNA - will have to occur before Deer Lodge can open.
The negotiations in which the unit is presently mired was referred to by the HSE in its answer to Cllr Culloty on Thursday. Staffing is to the fore of the issues the project group is working to resolve now ahead of getting the 40-bed mental health unit open.
Deputy Ferris meanwhile congratulated unions for their work on the matter, suggesting what he described as their ‘persistence’ has already paid off: “I want to congratulate the unions...Their persistence has paid off and hopefully, while being a small measure, it will provide some consolation for hard pressed families in Kerry.”