Study finds shortfall in services for abuse victims

A national review of sexual assault treatment services has identified a serious shortfall in the level of services available in the midland and western regions.

As a consequence, the report says, victims are dependent on ad-hoc arrangements that often involved long delays between the time the crime is reported to gardaí and the carrying out of a forensic examination.

The study noted that reporting rates of sexual assault in the HSE western and midland regions were less than half the national average.

It concluded that the lack of dedicated services in these regions acts as a deterrent to victims reporting to the gardaí.

In its main recommendation, the report calls for two further Sexual Assault Treatment Units, one each in Galway and the midlands, to supplement the five units that already exist in Dublin, Waterford, Cork, Limerick and Donegal.

The report also highlighted what it termed as an over-reliance on a register of GPs to act as forensic clinical examiners. It recommends that nurses be trained to specialise in forensic clinical examinations of victims of recent sexual crime and to give expert evidence in court.

The HSE is already developing this proposal.

Minister of State at the Department of Health Sean Power said the current response to sexual assault in this State was neither adequate nor acceptable.

Mr Power said it was important that the report's recommendations were implemented "so that we can offer an equitable and holistic service to those who have been injured and traumatised by the perpetrators of a truly appalling crime."

Minister of State at the Department of Justice Frank Fahey, the steering committee's chairman, said he would review the recommendations in the report that relate to his Department and the criminal justice system.

The report - commissioned by the National Steering Committee on violence against women - found there are no dedicated Sexual Assault Treatment Units in the mid western, western, midland or north eastern HSE regions.