Tenerife Child Psychiatric Services Near Collapse Amid Staffing Crisis
Families of children with ASD and ADHD in northern Tenerife are protesting the collapse of psychiatric services at the La Orotava Specialized Care Center, where chronic staffing shortages have left vulnerable patients without essential medical support.
Child and adolescent psychiatric care in northern Tenerife has reached a breaking point, raising serious concerns about the Canary Health Service’s ability to support its most vulnerable patients. The Visión Azul Autismo association reports that a failure to fill medical vacancies at the Specialized Care Center (CAE) in La Orotava has caused a collapse in services, severely impacting minors with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and ADHD.
This ongoing crisis has led to a cycle of cancelled appointments and major hurdles in accessing medication reviews. Families describe feeling abandoned by the system, noting that official complaints are met only with bureaucratic responses rather than actual improvements. The situation is dire: some children are suffering from recurring self-harm without proper hospital follow-up, while others face severe behavioral issues that prevent them from attending school, often worsened by interrupted medication.
The University Hospital of the Canary Islands (HUC), which manages the service, admits it is struggling to recruit specialists. While management claims to be reorganizing consultations to bridge the gap, families argue these measures are insufficient. They also report that clinical notes provided after emergency visits lack the detail needed to manage complex psychiatric conditions. The growing gap between the hospital’s promises of improvement and the reality on the ground has shattered trust, prompting families to organize a public demonstration for late October.
Affected groups are calling for a clear, practical solution: the permanent assignment of two specialists to the La Orotava CAE—one to focus on long-term patient care and another to handle new diagnoses. They argue this is essential to clear the current backlog, which currently prevents many children from obtaining the medical reports required for social aid and educational support. Ultimately, the lack of public psychiatric care is placing an unsustainable burden on families, who are being forced to manage their children’s complex needs without the professional clinical support they desperately require.