Borderline Personality Disorder

The Hon. K.L. VINCENT (14:40): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking questions of the minister representing the Minister for Health regarding Chloe Valentine's death and borderline personality disorder.

Leave granted.

The Hon. K.L. VINCENT: I am sure members are as saddened and shocked as I am by the tragically premature death of little Chloe. An article in which Justice Kelly was interviewed in The Australian newspaper on 22 April of this year stated:

Polkinghorne, who has a borderline personality disorder, was described as manipulative and narcissistic. 'Unless you undertook psychotherapy, any child you are responsible for in the future will remain at risk,' the judge said.

I refer the Minister for Health to the borderline personality disorder report titled 'An overview of current delivery of borderline personality disorder services in the public sector across South Australia and a proposed way forward' by Dr Martha Kent and Dr Prue McEvoy which in its primary recommendation states:

That a statewide specialist borderline personality disorder service be established to provide increased specialist expertise and support for clinicians working in both the public and private sectors including primary health care sector and NGOs.

Victoria has an excellent and cost-effective model in the Spectrum borderline personality disorder service that South Australia could easily model its own unit upon, and our state government departments have previously called upon experts from Spectrum because this is an excellent service and has well-trained experts. My questions are:

1. Given that this report was finally published in June 2014, after sitting inside Health SA for redrafts for more than a year, can the minister provide an indication of when a specialist borderline personality disorder unit will be established in South Australia? We would certainly like to know a time frame, as would many of my constituents.

2. Is the minister aware of the cost-effectiveness of establishing a statewide borderline personality disorder unit?

3. Could the minister advise how many cases there have been over the last 12 months of South Australian patients with borderline personality disorder who have taken their own lives because of misdiagnosis or failure of the mental health services to address borderline personality disorder? It has been brought my attention by specialists in mental health that there have been at least five cases of this in South Australia.

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills, Minister for Science and Information Economy, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (14:43): I thank the member for her questions and I will refer them to the Minister for Health in another place and bring back a response.