Maternity advocates urge creative thinking on mother and baby psychiatric units
Plans for a psychiatric unit which could admit mothers and babies remain in early stages, with just a feasibility study completed eight years after it was recommended.Maternity advocates called for creative thinking to provide this much-needed service instead of waiting on the construction.The Department of Health said the issue is being “actively progressed” by the department with the HSE and is in the programme for government.“The HSE is currently considering the results of a feasibility study regarding the location for the unit,” a department spokeswoman said.This is understood to centre on St Vincent’s Hospital campus in Dublin, already planned to also hold a new maternity hospital.The HSE said work on plans for the unit is ongoing, as is a review of the model of care for all perinatal mental health services.While this service has grown significantly since 2017, concerns remain.Chair of advocacy group Association for Improvements in the Maternity Service Ireland, Krysia Lynch, said the lack of a mother and baby in-patient unit is a real issue for women with severe mental illnesses.“In 2017 I made a lot of petitions on that initial strategy; for us to have not just one mother and baby unit but for us to have three mother and baby units, so we would have one in Dublin, one in the northwest, and one in the southwest," she said.Ms Lynch, who is also on the steering group for the new model of care, stressed while a unit in Dublin would be welcome, it is not a help for women from Kerry or Donegal. Krysia Lynch stressed while a unit in Dublin would be welcome, it is not a help for women from Kerry or Donegal.“We did argue, could we not have a standard operating procedure where a director of midwifery in conjunction with the psychiatrist could turn rooms in a maternity unit into a psychiatric ward, as and when it is needed?” she said.“Could they not provide the appropriate support in this way? Or maybe instead of transporting women around you have a team in each of the units, in the same way you have an early transfer home team?”"We’re waiting for the one big centralised, perfect thing to be built, but nothing is coming.” In the Irish Examiner on Wednesday, Dr Mas Mahady Mohamad at University Maternity Hospital Limerick's perinatal mental health services called for these units.“We definitely need mother and baby units in the country,” he said.“We have definitely noticed a need for this, and not just one unit because we will need to cater for patients across the country.” Minister of state for mental health Mary Butler has committed to doubling the multidisciplinary perinatal mental health teams over five years.She will also increase numbers of perinatal mental health midwife posts, her office said.
