Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy O'Loughlin for raising this issue. As the Minister of State, and as a Deputy from a county which is the equally lowest funded with regard to mental health, I understand where she is coming from.

As Deputy O'Loughlin said, Lakeview is a 29-bed acute mental health unit on the campus of Naas General Hospital. It was designed and built in the late 1980s to cater for the Kildare and west Wicklow population of 135,000 at that time. It succeeded the previous arrangement of services provided by the Carlow and St. Loman’s Dublin mental health services to the population of Kildare, and at the time was a ground-breaking development based on the then national policy, Planning for the Future. Some 30 years on, the current population of Kildare and west Wicklow has increased dramatically to 228,000, and is expected to rise over the coming years.

As the Deputy pointed out, increasing pressures on bed occupancy and levels of acuity have created a very high-risk environment for patients and staff. The HSE indicates the number of beds in Lakeview is inadequate for the current needs of the area, based on the national policy A Vision for Change. The occupancy rates of 140% provide further evidence of this increase in demand and obvious need. A temporary accommodation was reached three years ago, with ten acute beds being made available in the acute unit in Portlaoise for Kildare patients. However, this is not ideal by any means, the numbers remain inadequate and the demand and pressure on the Naas unit has reached unsafe levels again.

It is generally accepted there is a need to develop bed capacity in Naas. Development of the unit would have the effect of addressing the bed crisis situation and de-escalating acuity levels, by managing challenging patients in a more suitable environment. The Department of Health has provided sanction for €5.5 million funding to address some of the physical infrastructural deficits at the Lakeview unit. This funding will enable a design team to conduct scoping and design work, with a view to construction commencing in 2017 and being completed in 2019. This will deliver an additional eight beds and, most importantly, provide a high observation unit to alleviate existing service pressures at the facility.

The lack of appropriate step-down facilities in the form of high support hostels and community based teams also has an impact on the ability of Lakeview to deliver an appropriate service. A Vision for Change would recommend up to 60 high support hostel placements for a population of this size. There are currently only 27 places. The HSE is looking at possible solutions to maintain hostel support capacity in the area and is exploring the potential to increase it.

As part of the significant investment provided by Government over recent years to enhance all aspects of mental health services nationally, funding has been approved to recruit staff to populate three community-based mental health teams for the Kildare and west Wicklow area. This will mean that more patients, as appropriate, will be seen at a much lower level of complexity and will reduce the requirement for admissions to the Lakeview unit, which is where we want to take matters in future. Challenges are being experienced with the recruitment of psychiatric nurses to staff these teams, and work is ongoing nationally by the HSE to overcome acknowledged staffing difficulties. I assure the Deputy that, in light of the additional mental health funding being made available to the HSE for Lakeview, I will continue to monitor progress closely on the matter. I will update the Deputy and colleagues as it progresses.

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