Mental Health Reform welcomes the launch yesterday by the HSE of the report Value for Money: A comparison of cost and quality in two models of Adult Mental Health Service provision. Commenting on the report, Orla Barry, Director of Mental Health Reform said: “this is an important and timely report, which supports a community model of mental health services as the best way to achieve a good quality, cost effective service.”
“Due to staff losses and cut backs, community services are being sacrificed to staff the hospital services and the implication of this report is that this is actually counterproductive and more costly.” The community-based service examined in the report cost one fifth less per capita than the traditional hospital-based model, resulting from lower use of hospital beds and lower use of A&E services by people experiencing mental health difficulties.
“The government committed €35 million in Budget 2012 to provide a basic level of multidisciplinary staffing in community mental health teams across the country. We are now well into 2012 and there is an urgent need for the HSE to recruit and staff the teams and ensure an effective use of scarce resources”, concluded Ms. Barry.
