David Macpherson – Who Speaks for the Families and Whanau?

It’s coming up to three years since my son Nicky was a suicide victim while in the (compulsory) ‘care’ of the Waikato DHB, and I frequently reflect on the lack of voice families and whanau of mental health patients and suicide victims have.

Essentially, you’re on your own when your son, or daughter, or father, or mother, or brother, or sister goes into residential mental health care or becomes a suicide victim. Medical professionals (at least people with degrees and letters beside their names) will tell you their decisions about your loved ones, if you ask, but it’s a rare mental health professional who will actually listen and will conduct a genuine two-way discussion about treatment plans and the care and support available to your family member.

As the family of a suicide victim, we were given more helpful information by the Funeral home director, and offered more support by the ACC (albeit not much) than by any of the medical professionals from the DHB – the organisation that had placed my son under compulsory care, and had claimed to us that they “knew what they were doing”.

Since Nicky’s death, we have found this sort of treatment is the norm, not the exception. Last week we were contacted by the mother of a young man who had just become a suicide victim while in prison – and under the care of both the Corrections Dept and the Canterbury DHB. She had been told nothing about her family’s rights, or whether she could get an independent review of the circumstances around her son’s death, or what support was available to her.

Sometimes, when mental health patients or families complain to their DHB’s they are advised they can complain to the Health & Disability Commission – set up by recent Governments to supposedly provide an independent view of the health care received. Whether this happens or not, is a moot point, since it quite literally takes years for a complaint to be considered by the HDC – in the case of our son’s death I contacted the HDC to try and initiate an inquiry, but was told they would not touch the case until after all other avenues had been exhausted. Given it is now three years, and we haven’t even had a Coroner’s Inquest, it’s easy to see why many view the HDC as a waste of space.

Another waste of space are the lawyers appointed as ‘Visitors’ by the Health Minister for each residential mental health institution, supposedly with the authority to independently investigate complaints and poor processes. I’ve yet to hear of ANY substantial action anywhere in New Zealand by one of these oxygen thieves – again, in our son’s case we approached two of these ‘Visitors’ to the Waikato DHB, who initially agreed to meet with us, but cancelled the appointment without reason a few hours before it was due to occur. We were kicking up a public fuss about the ‘care’ our son received at that point, and our guess is that these lawyers were just too cowardly to meet with us.

Many DHB’s have ‘whanau and/or community liason officers’ in place supposedly to work with families in these circumstances – immediately after our son’s death we tried to meet with the Waikato DHB person in this position, as we had had some dealings with him while our son was still alive. He (and his lawyer) refused to meet, and he was shortly afterwards given another job within the DHB system.

The most honest and upfront response we have had from ANY Government agency has been from the Police (and the IPCA – Independent Police Conduct Authority), surprisingly enough. They have meticulously explained our rights to us, and discussed their processes in an open and helpful way – and been far more timely in their actions than the DHB, the Ministry of Health or the Coronial system (who make glaciers look fast-moving). We got ‘lucky’ when the Police asked a genuinely independent psychiatrist to review our son’s care at the DHB – while no criminal action has been taken, and the Coroner is currently banning any publication or discussion of this independent report, let me just say that the free QC being used by the DHB psychiatrist is strenuously opposing parts of it.

What I will also say is that getting a genuine, independent check or review of the ‘professionals’ work is well-worth fighting for, and something our family would advocate anyone else in our position should aim for.

Our family were, and are, experienced in wading through bureaucratic minefields, making sure the rats we smell are ferreted out, and making sure our voices are heard – yet we have been blindsided by the health and legal systems and have struggled to get our voice heard. So, how much harder is it for other families, and patients, that find themselves in these circumstances?

This is a message we will be putting to the new Government’s Mental Health Inquiry very forcefully, and it will not have done its job unless part of the outcome includes a mechanism for the voices of patients, families and whanau to be heard, and independently checked in a timely manner.