Review of housing for former patients

Press, 28 July 1987, Page 6

Review of housing for former patients

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in Wellington

The Minister of Health, Dr Bassett, has agreed with the deputy director of the Mental Health Foundation, Dr Hilary Haines, that the housing situation for former psychiatric patients is unsatisfactory. Dr Haines said that on discharge, many psychiatric patients encountered appallingly bad housing conditions.

It was often very difficult for former patients to find work and those with chronic mental disorders might be unable to perform adequately in an ordinary working environment anyway. Dr Bassett said that changes in the treatment of the psychiatrically ill

during the last decade had not always been matched by the provision of adequate community structures.

Dr Haines was right that co-ordination between the various Government and community agencies and hospital and area health boards needed improvement Although this was not a simple matter, the relevant Government agencies had been asked to review as a matter of urgency the policies and strategies, to achieve a better co-ordination between them, he said. Sheltered housing for former patients was extremely scarce in New Zealand, she said. Other countries that had adopted modern trends in psychiatric care

— focusing on brief treatment in hospital and early discharge — had found that massive problems arose where there was inadequate provision for care in the community.

Discharged psychiatric patients often had to wait in a long despairing queue, according to Ms Mary O’Hagen, speaking for Psychiatric Survivors. The group has been set up to represent the interests of former psychiatric patients and its members have had first-hand experience of inadequate and scarce accommodation.

Ms O’Hagen said this was the No. 1 problem for many former patients. They were among the most powerless and forgotten group in the community.