Mary Seery Kearney (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for taking the time to come to the House to deal with this in person.

I am working with a family who are incredibly caring and supportive of their 29-year-old son and brother who is a ward of court and has been in the care of the State for some years, since he left school. He was undergoing treatment under the auspices of the HSE in Dublin. At times, that treatment was satisfactory but at other times it was not meeting his needs. A decision was taken by the HSE 18 months ago to transfer him to St. Andrew's Healthcare in the UK. He was first diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome and then with autism. Now, St. Andrew's Healthcare has advanced a diagnosis of autism and an intellectual disability. It is only in the last year that this diagnosis has been made.

The difficulty is that no one is liaising with this family and giving them feedback. There appears to be no care plan. The family goes over to England on a regular basis to visit him. They say the experience is like going to a prison, given the number of stages they have to go through before they get to visit their son and brother. He is very interested in sports but has no access to sport or to watching it on television. The progression markers are exceptionally low but when they ask questions, neither the HSE nor St. Andrew's Healthcare is responding to the family. This young man is in the process of coming out of the ward of court system and into the assisted decision-making system but that has proven to be a very complicated process. We have a 29-year-old man who believes that he is coming home soon. He was told by the HSE that we was going to the UK for two years. That two-year deadline is coming up shortly and he is obsessed with the idea that he is coming home then but nobody knows anything about it. He is not in a position to engage with the progress of his care or to know what exactly is happening and he is not getting any feedback. There is no point of contact for the family. They have no idea of the set-up and from a mental health perspective, their view is that he has deteriorated in that time.

This is the first I have heard of us sending people to the UK on a long-term basis. The treatment purchase scheme is fantastic but I was not aware that we were using it to this extent. I will hustle the ward of court people on his behalf but in terms of the health aspect, how is there no oversight, feedback or care plan? It seems that because he is 29, a decision has been made that his family does not merit any information. That seems a most extraordinary situation, especially as his diagnosis has changed. Perhaps that is to be applauded because there may have been an undiagnosed condition over his life to date. Maybe that is an indication of progress but nevertheless, his family members are taking the time and bearing the expense of going to the UK to visit him on a very regular basis but nobody feels any obligation to tell them anything about their son and brother. In that context, I am wondering about the structures within the HSE that would allow such a lack of oversight. It seems a most extraordinary situation.