Acute psychiatric services are under pressure, according to the professor of adult psychiatry in UCD. Prof Patricia Casey, responding to the latest research, said support services for the severely mentally ill who cannot live independently were also scarce.
Prof Casey, who is based in the Mater Hospital and whose catchment area includes the deprived north inner city, added: "On a daily basis, psychiatrists have to beg for beds from colleagues in other units both inside our health board area and, more worryingly, from outside health boards also."
In a statement, the ERHA said that in line with Government policy, mental health services in the eastern region have been reorientated from an institutional to a community-based model in recent years.
"This has been accompanied by the development of community services and the establishment of modern in-patient services," a spokeswoman said.
She noted that more than €7 million had been spent since 1999 on capital development of mental health services in the eastern region.
Prof Casey also said there was a shortage of community forensic psychiatry facilities. "It is my belief that we need medium-secure units urgently for those patients who do not need to be in the Central Mental Hospital but who cannot be managed in an open ward in a psychiatric unit in a hospital."
A spokesman for the East Coast Area Health Board, which is responsible for the running of the Central Mental Hospital, said plans had been drawn up for the development of forensic psychiatry services there.
Earlier this year, it announced funding of €33 million for the project.