Acute psychiatric care should be administered at Mater Dei Hospital rather than at Mount Carmel, Mental Health Commissioner John Cachia keeps insisting.
Dr Cachia was contacted yesterday for his comments on a report that appeared in The Sunday Times of Malta saying that the government had a five-year plan to turn the mental health hospital in Attard into a “top notch” medical facility.
Asked if he welcomed the news, Dr Cachia referred to his latest annual report that said, among other things, that acute psychiatric care should move to the acute general hospital setting.
He is not alone in adopting that stand because mental health organisations have also questioned the government’s decision not to fulfil its electoral pledge of building a new psychiatric centre and, instead, rehabilitate Mount Carmel.
A Health Ministry spokeswoman said on Tuesday that the infrastructural plan for mental health had two major aspects: the refurbishment and restructuring of Mount Carmel and the planning and building of a new acute hospital on the Mater Dei campus.
With regard to the new acute hospital at Mater Dei, the Foundation for Medical Sciences had already acquired land and a medical brief was being drawn up, she added. Psychiatry chairman Anton Grech was leading the drafting of the medical brief, the spokeswoman noted.
Relevant stakeholders, including professionals, patient representatives and NGOs, would be consulted in the coming weeks, the spokeswoman said.
A project review board within the Health Ministry was set up and was piloting the development of the new facility, she said.
The government is planning to upgrade the Attard facility, built in 1861, raising its standard.
Calls for the hospital to be “dragged out of the Victorian era” have been getting louder in recent months. Just two weeks ago, a patient at the hospital was found dead after breaking out by climbing out of a window.
Staff lamented the lack of safety and security installations, which they feared made it easy for patients to escape.
Dr Cachia said his office advocated for reform of mental health and well-being services.
Malta, he said, needed a revised mental health policy, strategy and action plan reflecting the principles of the Mental Health Act and the recent trends in holistic approaches to mental health and well-being.
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The mainstay of care must be community-based where the primary care services and the general practitioner are supported by specialised and community rehabilitation facilities.
"Acute psychiatric care must move to the acute general hospital setting,” he said.
Dr Cachia added that dignified residential accommodation was required for long-term patients and those who did not make it through rehabilitation.
The parliamentary Health and Social Affairs Committee met on Wednesday to discuss the 2016 Annual Report of the Commission for Mental Health. Health Minister Chris Fearne said €30 million would be spent at Mount Carmel; this would include replacing water pipes which had been there since the hospital’s original opening over 150 years prior. Works were also underway on the Acute Mental Health Facility at Mater Dei Hospital.