Dr. Stephen Browne:

We have made a submission for what is called a slow stream rehabilitation unit. One of the problems with A Vision for Change is that it never took cognisance of the fact that there would be what are called new long-stay patients. These are patients who, due to the severity of their illness, require an admission to a psychiatric hospital for a year or longer. In 2004 it was postulated that by 2011 there would be no new long-stay patients, but that has not happened. Since the first quarter of 2013, there have been 416 new long-stay patients nationally, of which, fortunately, only 29, or 6.3%, were in the CHO5 area. In order to ease the pressure on acute inpatient units, it would be ideal to have a regional slow stream rehabilitation unit for these new long-stay patients who require ongoing inpatient care but not necessarily in an acute psychiatric unit.