Dr. John Sheehan:

I will reply to some of the questions that have not been covered so far. Senator Bacik asked if I could state that X would never commit suicide. I do not believe any psychiatrist or doctor can ever make a statement that a certain person will never commit suicide. It is equally true, however, that it is also impossible for a doctor to state that somebody will commit suicide. The position in which psychiatrists are potentially placed by the legislation is to state that there is a real and substantial risk that the person will complete suicide. Even studies that looked at very high risk populations, which do not include the population we are discussing, show that in such very high risk populations an expert will be wrong in 97 cases out of 100. Prediction is, therefore, very difficult; in fact, the word I would use is "impossible".

To tie this in with the issue raised by Senator Crown, psychiatrists are experts in assessment and treatment. However, this brings us back to the same area, namely, one of prediction, which is something psychiatrists cannot do. While we are extremely good at dealing with and managing risk, in other words, reducing risk, prediction of the future is something completely different.

On the issues of assessing people in a compassionate manner and prejudgment, I return to the point that the group we are talking about are individuals who are extremely distressed and may be utterly hopeless and see no way forward except ending their life. That is the reason I stated that the management of a psychiatric emergency in that type of situation is totally at odds with the management of an obstetric emergency.