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Legislative Council - Fifty-First Parliament, Second Session (51-2)
2008-07-23 Daily Xml
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MENTAL HEALTH

The Hon. C.V. SCHAEFER (14:56): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse a question on country health.

Leave granted.

The Hon. C.V. SCHAEFER: It is well documented that there is a shortage of trained professionals working in the mental health and substance abuse area in rural and regional South Australia and, indeed, in South Australia generally. We are constantly informed by the Minister for Health that this shortage will be minimised, if not alleviated, under the new Country Health Plan, and that services will be provided in the four general country hospitals as well as the services that are provided in the city now.

Will the minister advise the council of what additional funding and services will be provided to the four general country hospitals due to what will be a massively increased workload, and can she advise the council of where the provisions for these extra services are shown in the budget (either the current budget or the five-year forward estimates), and what recruiting is being done to either obtain or train the extra professionals needed to carry out the promises made in the Country Health Plan?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Environment and Conservation, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister Assisting the Minister for Health) (14:57): I thank the honourable member for her questions concerning mental health services in country regions. We do, indeed, already provide a comprehensive set of services to our country regions, and they are spread throughout the regions. We have a South Australian Country Health Care Plan that has been released for consultation and is about integrating the mental health system throughout South Australia.

The range of mental health services include our rural and remote health services at Glenside and, of course, funding will continue for that. That has been outlined in our redevelopment program for the Glenside campus, and it is in the current budget. We have a range of specialist mental health services situated across regional South Australia. We have visiting Aboriginal mental health services to remote communities in the APY lands.

We have visiting psychiatrists across country South Australia. We have mental health promotion programs to address areas of stigma, increase awareness and encourage early recognition. I have spoken at length about those sorts of programs in this chamber before, so I will not go through those details again. Some of those programs are funded under the suicide prevention initiative of the Social Inclusion Board and operate via Country Health SA's health promotional allocations. We have mental health inpatient initiatives to enable local hospitals to better respond to the needs of those people. These will line up with the key public hospitals that are outlined in our Country Health Care Plan, and work has already commenced with that in terms of the sorts of developments we see at Port Lincoln, for instance.

Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services was allocated $1.9 million over four years to employ additional clinicians across country regions. CAMHS has also commenced a visiting service to the APY lands. The visiting team comprises a psychiatrist, a social worker and two Aboriginal mental health consultants. It has funded some Anangu education workers' time in the six main APY lands schools to be linked to the community and consult with the visiting team. In order to support people recovering from mental illness across country, in partnership with the Department of Families and Communities and NGOs, 65 supported accommodation places have been made available.

An honourable member interjecting:

The Hon. G.E. GAGO: It is endless.

Members interjecting:

The Hon. G.E. GAGO: The service operates—I was asked what services are available in the country, and they do not like to hear the answers. This government has done more for mental health services, both in metropolitan and in country areas, than the former Liberal government and, in fact, probably since any government that has gone before in South Australia.

In terms of the rural and remote services operating from Glenside, it provides a metropolitan-based acute inpatient service, but it includes:

23 specialist inpatient beds;

a distance consultant and liaison service;

emergency triage and liaison service open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, which is a telephone support and advice service throughout regional South Australia;

emergency psychiatric and crisis intervention, counselling and support;

specialist advice to consumers, carers and health professionals;

liaison with rural hospitals;

triage;

referral to regional providers; and—

Members interjecting:

The Hon. G.E. GAGO: I was asked what services we provide in the country.

The Hon. J.M.A. Lensink: You weren't.

The Hon. G.E. GAGO: I was. I was asked about them in an interjection and I am very happy to give an outline. There are also significant suicide prevention mental health services, which I have outlined previously, particularly the additional services that have been allocated in the budget in relation to the drought response to our country areas. So, you can see a great deal of resources and planning has been done. We continue with a very extensive recruitment and retention program for all our specialist services, including those services provided in country areas. In terms of budgetary implications, the honourable member knows that all future budget considerations are done through a budgetary process, and we will continue to develop and advance our mental health services, not only through metropolitan South Australia, which we are overhauling and completely reforming, but also through country and regional South Australia.

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