Dr. Helen McMonagle:

I am thankful for the opportunity to address the committee. I am here to represent the needs of people affected by alcohol-related brain jury. Our experiences of the Covid-19 pandemic brought into sharp focus the extensive health and social care inequities that exist for this group. While many other groups experience reductions, changes or delays in services being delivered, for the vast mast majority of people with alcohol-related brain injury the pandemic highlighted further the absence of any specific resources for the group across the island of Ireland. That is perpetuated by a lack of specific provision for this group of people who have dual needs in the area of addiction and around early identification, management and rehabilitation of their brain injury. There is a dearth of services that meet both of those needs simultaneously.

We know from models of best practice internationally that multidisciplinary neuro-rehabilitation teams are best placed to meet the needs of people with alcohol-related brain injury. That involves intensive input from addiction services and input from psychology, occupational therapy, social work and neuropsychiatry. We do not have that capacity at the moment. Those difficulties are reinforced by the lack of a specific policy or strategy that recognises the needs of people with alcohol-related brain injury. We spoke before the health committee in 2019 and made a recommendation for the establishment of a multi-directorate national working group that could come together to tease out the barriers we experience extensively in relation to alcohol-related brain injury across the island of Ireland and try to find a means of moving forward in mapping out clinical care pathways for this condition, identifying resources required, putting business plans together, getting them funded and getting services up and running. I very much reinforce the recommendation about the need for that national working group.