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Audit of the first year of a psychiatric clinic at a Dublin Maternity Hospital

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 June 2014

Miriam Gannon ,
Siobhan Barry  and
Michael Turner
Siobhan Barry
Affiliation:
Cluain Mhuire Service, Blackrock, Co Dublin and Visiting Consultant Psychiatrist, Coombe Women's Hospital, Dublin 8, Ireland.
Michael Turner
Affiliation:
Coombe Women's Hospital, Dublin 8, Ireland.
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Abstract

Objectives: The aims of the audit were to monitor the activities of the liaison clinic over a 12 month period, to establish the number of attenders and non-attenders and to evaluate whether the service was meeting the needs of patients with perinatal disorders.

Method: The Coombe Women's Hospital is one of three maternity hospitals in Dublin and had 6,452 deliveries and 5,273 inpatient gynaecological procedures performed in 1994. The charts of all the patients who were given an appointment for the psychiatric clinic between January 1 and December 31, 1994 were reviewed.

Results: Fifty-six patients attended the clinic over the 12 month period, 38(68%) of whom were new referrals to the service. Twenty-two patients were antenatal, 20 were postnatal and 14 patients were attending the gynaecology department. Seventeen patients (30%) who were referred to the clinic failed to attend for their first appointment. Forty-one (73%) patients had sufficient symptomatology to make an ICD-10 diagnosis. Medication was prescribed for 58% of those who attended. Four patients were referred to their catchment area service for inpatient care: six patients were referred to their catchment area service for further outpatient care as they had psychiatric illnesses which predated their pregnancies.

Conclusions: The number of patients referred to the liaison service with postnatal depression is remarkably less than that anticipated and there is a high rate of defaulting among first attenders. Various recommendations are made to improve the effectiveness of the service.

Keywords

AuditLiaisonPsychiatric service
Type
Audit
Information
Irish Journal of Psychological Medicine , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , December 1998 , pp. 142 - 144
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1998

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