We expect hospitals to be places we go to get better. As Kate Aubusson reported on Sunday, this is not what happened to Gitta Mueller and Doug Sewell’s daughter, Bec, who endured almost 100 hospital admissions before her death by suicide last year.
Since then, every indication suggests the experience of many acute mental health patients in NSW hospitals has only worsened.
Gitta Mueller with her daughter Bec, who died last year.
More than 200 NSW public psychiatrists tendered their resignations in January – when one-third of the state’s public psychiatry positions were vacant – amid a pay battle with the state government. Roughly 60 have followed through. Others have deferred, rescinded or taken higher-paid contractor roles.
The doctors say their pay trails other states and working conditions are untenable. The government says it cannot fund the salary increases they seek.
While many of the psychiatrists have delayed their resignations, the NSW government and the Australian Salaried Medical Officers’ Federation NSW, the union representing doctors, failed to reach an agreement in the Industrial Relations Commission earlier this month.
Peak mental health organisations – including the peak bodies for psychiatrists and psychologists – say not enough is being done to address the crisis in hospitals.
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Last week’s federal budget included a $44 million funding boost for Headspace. But, from these organisations’ perspective, when governments talk about mental health – and when they open their wallets – the conversation too often focuses on less acute patients than the ones who present to public emergency rooms.
Tackling loneliness in the community, virtual psychology services for conditions such as depression and anxiety, and mental wellbeing awareness campaigns are worthwhile, but when reading a story like Bec’s, it is clear these sorts of initiatives would not have helped – she required appropriate treatment for the medical conditions she presented to hospital with, and, according to one doctor who treated her towards the end of her life, her failure to receive it made that condition worse.
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