9 December 2004

  Relocation of the Central Mental Hospital

The Irish College of Psychiatrists is strongly opposed to any amalgamation or positioning of the Central Mental Hospital in the proposed ‘new Mountjoy prison complex’.  This is not the appropriate location for a hospital service.

Mentally ill patients who end up in contact with the criminal justice system and also some patients who have exceeded the capacity of their local psychiatric hospital are transferred for specialist treatment at the Central Mental Hospital.  Many of this latter group will not have offended and will be undergoing routine medical treatment.

The Central Mental Hospital is designed to provide a therapeutic environment in which mentally ill patients are provided with appropriate treatment and rehabilitation.  The geographical independence of the present service is an important factor for patients, staff and visiting families.

By placing the new Central Mental Hospital in close proximity to the new prison complex would undoubtedly add further stigma to an already disadvantaged group within our society.  To contemplate such a joint complex would represent retrograde thinking and would not be in keeping with best medical practice. 

The Irish College of Psychiatrists supports the view that there must be very clear boundaries between a hospital whose primary function is medical treatment and a prison whose primary functions are incarceration and correction.