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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, First Session (53-1)
2014-10-28 Daily Xml
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Mental Health Beds

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING (Playford—Minister for Health, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts, Minister for Health Industries) (14:17): I seek leave to make a ministerial statement.

Leave granted.

The Hon. J.J. SNELLING: There has recently been an increase in mental health service demand and this has placed pressure on our emergency departments and acute units. Over the past five years, mental health emergency department presentations in our metropolitan hospitals have increased by an average of 3 per cent per annum, which is in line with the increase in general emergency department presentations. While this is a complex problem, I am determined to continue to find improvements to ensure we improve the service for vulnerable mental health patients, as well as ease pressures on our valuable staff.

It is completely unacceptable to me that we have mental health patients waiting for days at a time for an admission into an acute bed. An emergency department is not, in my view, an appropriate setting for ongoing care of people experiencing an acute episode, and concern has been expressed to me, and raised publicly, that this could further stigmatise patients.

We are taking action, but getting new mental health beds up and running has been slower than anticipated. My department tells me they have had difficulty recruiting psychiatrists so that new beds can be opened. However, I can advise the house of the government's plan, which will see an overall increase in 30 adult mental health acute beds, and these arise from the creation and opening of new services. These changes comprise:

The Lyell McEwin Hospital will open four additional beds within its mental health unit next month.

The Flinders Medical Centre will open an eight-bed short-stay unit adjacent to the emergency department. This is in addition to the five extra beds currently operating at the Margaret Tobin Centre. This will also occur next month.

Mount Gambier will open a new six-bed inpatient unit in April 2015. This is in addition to the recent opening of 12 beds in Whyalla and Berri in April and June this year respectively.

We are also preparing for the transition to the new Royal Adelaide Hospital by making changes to the current 20-bed Ward C3 unit at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. Eighteen beds from Ward 3C will transfer to Glenside Health Services, and the two remaining beds will boost the Royal Adelaide Hospital's existing five-bed short-stay unit to seven beds. This change will enable a direct admission service to be established at the Royal Adelaide Hospital so some mental health patients will bypass the emergency department. This direct admission will also operate at the new Royal Adelaide Hospital when it opens in 2016. There will also be an additional 10 forensic beds when the new James Nash House redevelopment is completed in May 2015.

I have spoken with many clinicians and I know that the system lacks the agility to move quickly to transfer all mental health patients from emergency departments to appropriate care. We need much greater flexibility in the use of our existing beds, and these changes are a step in that direction. In July, we opened 24 crisis respite beds and began a service that will enable 10 people to be cared for at home. These 10 people who are in crisis would normally have attended an emergency department for assistance, but instead are able to receive care at home.

We have also implemented a project designed to enable patients who have long stays in hospital to move into more clinically appropriate environments. This has been possible due to a review of intermediate care centre beds, resulting in greater flexibility in the use of those beds by psychiatrists. This has resulted in four long-stay consumers in in the Southern Adelaide Local Health Network, moving from an acute to a subacute environment, and one consumer being discharged to community-based accommodation with Disability SA.

This successful project is being translated to other regions so that mental health clinicians have more options available for addressing long-stay patients. More long-stay and complex patients will be admitted to intermediate care centre beds when psychiatrists indicate it is safe to do so. Providing safe and effective care in an appropriate environment is a priority, and these proposals are expected to benefit both mental health consumers and staff.

During the debate on mental health beds, let us not forget that South Australia's mental health system treats approximately 34,000 people with a mental illness each year. Our community mental health teams provide an invaluable service by supporting these people through more than 500,000 contacts in a year.

I also announce today that Chief Psychiatrist and Director of Mental Health Policy, Dr Peter Tyllis, has advised me he wishes to take up a clinical position in the Central Adelaide Local Health Network mental health service. I wish Dr Tyllis every success in this new role.

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