He describes his own Golgotha in protothema.gr Apostolos Vlachos for a serious family matter he has been dealing with for the last 17 years without being able to find a solution.
It all started when his brother started doing drug use at the age of 19. His drug addiction, doctors say, triggered psychiatric problems his brother was already dealing with. His first move was to get him into programs addiction, to enter counseling communities and get help from specialist doctors, psychologists and psychiatrists.
“Unfortunately it didn’t work. My second serious and organized effort was in 2009 when I decided to leave Athens, taking my brother with me in Crete. Things got complicated there because even though I had the support of a brotherly friend of mine and my partner at the time as well as other friends of ours, the University Hospital of Heraklion did not help us. For a whole year we managed and kept my brother away from all substances hoping that the psychiatrists at the hospital would have the solution. But unfortunately, apart from a modest suppression of his aggression, they didn’t manage to do anything else.”
His brother referred himself to all the competent bodies of Crete and finally at the urging of the therapists they returned to Athens in order to join his drug addict relative in a program that accepts ex-drug addicts for rehab (while he was already clean for a year) but which could also ensure his medication, something that only existed in Athens.
“After our return to Athens, he joined programs which unfortunately either could not help him or he himself did not want to be helped. I then left to fulfill my military obligations, close to home so I could help. Other programs followed. many prosecutorial orders resulting in his incarceration too many times in psychiatric institutions of Athens and slowly removing it from any aid program. Largely as many of his therapists have said to this day because he didn’t want to be helped himself, we didn’t get any results. I partly believe that too, but the fact that scientists themselves argue and contradict each other between mental illness and substance dependence leaves me with a lot of doubts.”
Now, according to the complainant, the condition of his brother it had gotten worse as he exercises physical and psychological violence to his parents.
“My brother has become unrecognizable. To preserve my own mental health I have distanced myself from him and try to deal only with my parents with whom my brother lives and has turned their life into a daily torture. I should emphasize at this point that both parents have been facing serious health problems since the beginning of this whole story. My father has completed almost every medical illness and episode worst a stroke when I was 15 years old. My mother has psychiatric conditions which, however, with medication she manages and regulates to the extent that she is functional. Regarding their financial situation, I will only mention that with two meager pensions, they manage to meet the basic expenses by receiving help from the church, and their children”.
The prosecutor’s order for the Atticon
On 10/2/2024 the drug addict brother of the complainant faced another severe crisis incident as a result of which his parents his parents requested with a prosecutor’s office that he be transported by the police to the Atticon Hospital for an examination. “However, on the same day he was released and as the doctors told us at the outpatient clinic, “he gave us his word that he will not create a problem”. So the doctors giving him taxi money returned home and handshake against my father.”
The following day, according to the allegations of the complainant, Apostolos Vlachos, his parents again requested prosecutorial intervention, with the result that his drug addict brother was released again on the same day of his examination.
“This unfortunately had a terribly negative influence on my parents and me as we lost all hope. Fear had now overwhelmed us all since the aggressiveness of my brother threatened and threatens our lives. In the last week, in an explosion of violence by my brother, my father just managed to escape from the house and call for help. There I decided that I must again put myself through all the soul-destroying procedures of the system and try with all my might this time to be locked up in a mental institution to avoid the worst. The only positive thing about this case is that all the police officers I relied on were able to guide me and help me substantially. The result is my brother to is being treated at Dromokaiteio since last Thursday night hoping that some miracle will happen and that his hospitalization will not take days counted on the fingers of one hand and that they will manage to start regulating his medication which he himself was not following. My parents now tremble at the prospect of my brother returning home again…”.
Sure OK. Apostolos Vlachos, sent on Thursday (25/4) and a letter to the Minister of Health, Adonis Georgiadis, in which she informed him about the non-execution of the prosecutor’s order.
In detail what he wrote in his letter:
“To the Minister of Health Mr. Adonis Georgiadis
I am in the unpleasant position of informing you of a very serious incident that took place at the Attica hospital and almost turned into a tragedy.
I am informing you of medical malpractice, since apparently nothing was done in practice, for the involuntary psychiatric hospitalization of my brother, following a prosecutor’s order, who is dealing with and has been hospitalized in the past with serious psychiatric problems and his illness makes him, extremely dangerous.
You are well aware that in the involuntary prosecutor’s order, the examination/interview is carried out in the Emergency Department of the respective Public psychiatric clinic (either a Public psychiatric hospital or a Public general hospital) by at least 2 psychiatrists, with the participation, usually, of a small group of psychiatric workers who on duty (e.g. psychiatry specialists and psychologists).
At this stage, the psychiatrists in charge study the written witness statements (the contents of which, very often, happen to be unknown to the person brought in for examination) and after the person being examined is asked to provide some information or to answer some questions his companions (relatives, etc.) are also requested to provide as much information as they can in order to facilitate the examination process and the making of a decision on the necessity or not of forced hospitalization according to the criteria defined in the Law (SEE L.2071/92, article 95, par 2).
What happens after the exam?
After the examination, the 2 psychiatrists must respond to the prosecutor within a maximum of 48 hours as to whether they recommend for the person examined (i) compulsory hospitalization, or (ii) non-hospitalization possibly combined with an alternative treatment proposal in the community. That is, the psychiatrists must respond to the prosecutor who ordered the examination, in writing and documented, as to whether the conditions defined by the law for involuntary hospitalization are met (SEE Law 2071/92, article 95, par. 2). That is, if the person who allegedly suffers from a psychiatric disorder or has received a diagnosis in the past, is judged to be “not capable of judging in the interest of his health” it is expected that if he is not hospitalized “his health condition will worsen” or is judged that his hospitalization is necessary “to prevent acts of violence against himself or third parties”.
On 10/2/2024, my brother Vlachos Alexandros of Nikolaou, born in 1989, following my prosecutor’s order, was taken to the outpatient clinics of the psychiatric department of the Attica hospital.
Disregarding all prescribed action, he was not admitted to the hospital, he was pickpocketed, put into a taxi and sent home, where he brutally beat our parents, who were hospitalized.
Today 25/04/2024 you are being held at the Acropolis Police Station after he has brutally beaten our parents once again and I just wonder what will happen. Is it another incident of violence, we see it developing in front of us and we don’t care? Will we be the next relatives of victims, who will find a way and a means to seek our justice in the media?
Do you need to lean in with more truth, care and interest to issues that are troubling you?
Do you as citizens of this state owe us more importance and more seriousness to our complaints?
Do the doctors of the Attica hospital have to be held accountable for being satisfied with the promise of a psychiatric patient that he will not do it again and sending him home with tragic consequences?
I hope you will take this letter seriously before it is too late and we mourn new victims.”
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Tags: Drug addict rampage Atticon prosecutors order doctors paid taxi home
