HSE South West publishes Look Back Review into North Kerry CAMHS

The final report, including the external lookback review into the standards of care provided by the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS) in North Kerry has been completed and shared with families today (Feburary 18 2026). 

The report and an FAQ prepared to updated the young people and families involved are available here:

1) The full report

2) An FAQ document prepared for families

The Kerry CAMHS information line can be contacted on 1800 700 700 or 01 240 87 87. Please note that this is a new number.

The information line has extended opening hours over the next few days:

• Monday to Friday, 8am to 8pm.
• Saturday February 21 from 9am to 5pm.

HSE South West has apologised to the young people and their families. HSE South West has previously met with all families who wished to meet, where a potential for major or moderate harm was identified in the lookback review, through the HSE’s open disclosure process.  A Clinical Liaison Support Team (CLST) is established to provide clinical guidance and co-ordinated signposting to families and remains in place. 

This report arises from the publication of the Maskey report which documented significant concerns regarding diagnosis and treatment of mental disorder, in particular prescribing and medication safety in CAMH services in South Kerry.  The North Kerry lookback review was commissioned in May 2023. Its purpose was to carry out a Recall process for all cases that were open to the service as of November 21st 2022.   

Of the 374 files reviewed, a risk of potential for harm was found in 209 files (52%) while 165 (44%) were found not to be at the risk for harm. The Lookback Review Team used the HSE Risk Management Policy 2023 to describe categories of harm. 

• Extreme Harm:  No concerns regarding extreme harm in any of the 374 files reviewed.
• Moderate/Major Harm:  Two cases were considered to be of risk of major harm.  195 (53%) cases were viewed to be at risk of moderate harm. 
• Minor Harm:  The potential for harm to be minor was determined in 12 files reviewed (3%). These families were issued with a letter of correspondence to that effect.  

The report details key findings including a high rate of prescribing of psychotropic medication, failures in compliance with recommended physical health assessment and monitoring and a disproportionately low rate of individual or family/systemic psychotherapeutic interventions. These findings are inconsistent with standard practice in CAMHS nationally. 

Regional Executive Officer HSE South West, Dr Andy Phillips said:

“I am truly sorry for the harm that has been done to the young people and their families affected by the contents of this report.  On behalf of the HSE I wish to apologise again to all those individuals and families who did not receive the care they should have. The report makes for difficult reading, as it is very clear that the service which many young people received was not up to standard.   We regret the delay in finalising the report and appreciate continued patience and understanding while waiting for the final recommendations and conclusions of the review team.  The report makes recommendations about what we in the HSE can do to prevent this from reoccurring. We have already acted on many of these, and I want to promise you that work is underway to make sure that all of these recommendations are acted on.”

We also confirm today our intention to carry out a clinical review of files of young people in Kerry who accessed North Kerry CAMHS services over a defined period prior to November 2022 who:

• have either a diagnosis of intellectual disability or
• who were prescribed antipsychotic medication or
• who received high dose psychotropic medication during their care and treatment with CAMHs.