A chara, – Yesterday I received a letter from the HSE asking me whether I wanted to proceed with an assessment of need for my child, a referral that started making its way through the system in 2019. The letter stated that the preliminary assessment my child had in 2020 did not comply with the Disability Act, as ruled on by the High Court. It’s obvious to anyone that an hour in a room with an occupational therapist and a speech and language therapist with no psychologist present was wholly inadequate, and there have been no services offered to us since. Along with thousands of other families, we languish on some waiting list or other.
However, the real stickler, the insult added to injury, the bit that makes you question your own sanity, is that the assessment officer writing the letter instructs us to reply by January 13th or the application will not proceed! We received this letter on January 10th. We have been waiting over five years for an offer of any help or support from the HSE, yet they deem this an appropriate turnaround time for a response.
Congratulations to the HSE on finding another way to reduce waiting lists without a child actually seeing a professional. – Yours, etc,
CLAIRE McSWEENEY,
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Donabate,
Co Dublin.