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148 Standalone Chapters 2020 | NMH Annual Rep t I n November 2017, the National Specialist Perinatal Mental Health Model of Care was launched. This strategy document planned for the development of Specialist Perinatal Mental Health Services, (SPMHS) in all maternity units in the country. This would involve the development of specialist teams requiring funding and the recruitment and training of staff for these posts. A National Oversight and Implementation Group (NOIG) was then set up to oversee the roll out of this model of care. In The National Maternity Hospital, this has allowed for the development of the multidisciplinary team which in 2020 welcomed a new Clinical Nurse Specialist (CNS) and mental health midwife (MH Midwife). It is planned that the team will recruit an additional CNS and MH Midwife in 2021 and develop a new specialist post for a Senior Occupational Therapist. Dr McCarthy and Adele Kane are members of the NOIG. The Model of Care includes a plan to open the country's first Mother and Baby Unit as part of the Department of Psychiatry at St Vincent's University Hospital and Dr McCarthy is a member of the planning group for this. The SPMHS provides for mental health care needs from the booking visit to up to 1 year after birth. We will also provide specialist pre-conceptual Perinatal Mental Heal advice. The expansion of the team has coincided with significantly increased referral to the team and attendance at clinics (see graph below). The COVID-19 pandemic posed particular challenges for patients and staff with a marked increase in demand for telephone consultations and online video calls. This was facilitated using the HSE's Attend Anywhere service and all of the team were provided with laptops for this. The SPMH team provides support and training for the Mental Health Midwife appointed at Wexford General Hospital and are at an advanced stage of planning to provide and remote tertiary referral clinic for maternity patients attending the midwife at hospital. The team provide ongoing teaching for UCD and RCSI medical students, UCD midwifery students, and for Social Work and Psychology students also. Of note, the Charter Day speaker for 2020 was, for the first time, a Perinatal Psychiatrist, Dr Roch Cantwell from Glasgow who is the lead psychiatry assessor for the UK and Ireland Confidential Enquiries into Maternal Deaths. The team also provided key support to the Placenta Accreta Group Dr McCarthy is the Clinical Lead for Schwartz rounds which have been successfully continuing in the hospital throughout the pandemic.