Close WA psychiatric hospital, doctors say

The Australian Medical Association has joined calls for Perth's Graylands Hospital to be closed, saying mental health patients are being forced to live in 19th-century conditions.

Western Australia's largest psychiatric facility came under the spotlight after the acting director-general of the health department, Bryant Stokes, told a parliamentary committee he wanted to "blow up" the "archaic" facility.

Professor Stokes said he hoped a decision to close Graylands would be made in the next few years.

AMA WA president Michael Gannon said the living conditions of mental health patients had not kept up with the times.

"We should not force mental health patients to live in 19th-century conditions," he said.

"We hope Professor Stokes' comments will spur the state government into action."

Dr Gannon said some patients needed treatment in specialised long-term facilities that did not have to be within a mental hospital.

Alison Xamon, of the WA Association for Mental Health, agreed the hospital was hopelessly outdated.

"It's not somewhere you would want to go ... or somewhere that you'd want to send a loved one," she told Fairfax radio.

Ms Xamon said if Graylands was sold off, the money should be reinvested in mental health.