RHUN AP IORWERTH

COLUMNIST

MENTAL health was put high on the agenda last week as Plaid Cymru tabled two debates which linked closely together.

One emphasised our belief that no patient experiencing mental health problems should be sent to units that are long distances from their family, while the other was on support for those with eating disorders who also too often have to travel over the border to England.

There are grave concerns about the principle of sending people a long way from home, but also specific concerns about the quality of the care that is provided in many of these units.

One example was a father telling us that he has not been able to speak to or see his autistic son for over three years.

His son is living in a unit that has been the subject of a shocking report by the Care Quality Commission, a unit that has seen the use of physical restraint increasing.

Another patient from Wales with anorexia is in the unit. She is allowed only three phone calls of 10 minutes per week with her relatives at home, and there are restrictions on what they can discuss during those calls.

That doesn’t sound acceptable to me, and there are a number of similar cases that have arisen.

But even if there wasn’t a concern about the quality of the care provided, there is a very important point of principle about the impact on the wellbeing of a patient of being many hours and many hundreds of miles away from home, not being able to communicate with relatives, often not knowing how long they will be there, and certainly feeling very isolated from those care networks that are so important to people.

Wales doesn’t have an eating disorder residential unit. It was a pleasure to have a conversation with a young woman who’s a constituent of mine, Sara, before the debate about her experiences.

She had to travel a very long way from home to England in order to access treatment, and she was only a teenager at the time. That’s unacceptable.

Let’s also remember the closure of the mother and baby unit in Cardiff for mothers suffering postpartum psychosis – a decision that did serious damage.

You will hear the argument being made sometimes that the critical mass of population doesn’t exist here in Wales, but for most conditions we certainly do have a population that desperately needs that care close to home.

It’s poor historical patterns in terms of the commissioning of care that has placed us in this position.

So enough of the excuses; let’s send a very clear message that this has to end, and that we have to develop a health service that truly suits our needs as a nation.

■ Rhun ap Iorwerth is the health spokesman for Plaid Cymru