Inquiry to learn more about Lionel Desmond’s in-patient psychiatric treatment

The Lionel Desmond inquiry will learn more about the two-and-a-half months the Afghanistan veteran spent at an in-patient psychiatric facility, with more employees of the hospital set to testify Wednesday.

A psychiatrist, psychologist and social worker who worked with Desmond at Ste. Anne’s Hospital in Montreal already testified earlier this month that he continued to show severe symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder and major depression nearly 10 years after his return from Afghanistan. 

They described a patient who became more resistant to medication and to talking about the trauma he’d experienced. But his social worker, Kama Hamilton, did say that Desmond expressed motivation to try to get better and have a normal family life. 

But when he was released from the Veterans Affairs-funded program in August 2016, there was no treatment set up for him when he returned to Guysborough County, N.S.

Instead, he would not meet with a therapist through Veterans Affairs until December 2016. 

A month later, he fatally shot his wife, Shanna, his mother, Brenda, his daughter, Aaliyah, and then himself at a home in Upper Big Tracadie, N.S. 

The effect of that gap in treatment would have worsened Desmond’s PTSD symptoms, other psychiatrists have already testified at the inquiry, which is being held in Port Hawkesbury, N.S. 

The CBC’s Laura Fraser is liveblogging the inquiry:

To read more about the Desmond inquiry: