This article is from page 4 of the 2010-03-02 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 4 JPG
through the Freedom of Informa- tion Act, show that the number of people attending the mid-west’s Sex- ual Assault Unit last year increased by 11 per cent from 36 to 40.
The centre serves mainly Clare, Limerick and Tipperary and the number of Clare women attending the centre last year dropped from 12 to eight while the number of Limer-
ick women increased from 17 to 23 and the number of Tipperary women rose from four to seven.
The centre, which is based at the Mid-West Regional Hospital in Lim- erick, has been in operation since 2006 and prior to the introduction of the out of hours service, victims had to travel to Cork. This caused consid- erable problems for victims of sexual assaults as they only have 72 hours after the incident to undergo a foren- sic examination.
The unit is funded through a €30,000 annual budget to support on-call and call-out fees to GPs on the Forensic Medical Examination
Roster.
Rape Crisis Centre director Miriam Duffy said, “It is very sad that the numbers are increasing year on year. We are so thankful that the unit is there, but there is a need for a full- NbN emo ms lome
She said that research is to take place this year on cases that went before the courts and to the DPP for women who underwent a forensic examination in the aftermath of an PLLA
However, she pointed out recent research that showed 70 out of 100 complaints are dropped when the case files go to the office of the Di-
rector of Public Prosecutions (DPP) which decides whether to prosecute or not.
A spokesman for the HSE said that the success of the Sexual Assault Treatment Unit (SATU) was attrib- uted to the fruitful collaboration of Shannondoc, the Mid-West Regional Hospital Limerick, the Gardai, Rape Crisis Centre and the forensic exam- nay
“The service would benefit from extra resources to enable its hours to become extended and to enable the increased presence of rape crisis counsellors to victims and gardai at the time of an examination.”