Sounds like you've got 1 output/IRC thr which talks to multiple external progs (brain progs).
1 option is to use a tcp connect with timeout option eg:

    if( !$send_socket )
    {
        # Create socket
        $socket_errmsg = "";
        $send_socket =
        IO::Socket::INET->new( PeerAddr => $server_ip,
                               PeerPort => $server_port,
                               Proto    => "tcp",
                               Timeout  => $cfg::params{'CONNECT_TIMEO
+UT'}
                             )
                    or $socket_errmsg = "Couldn't create socket to ".
                                        "$server_ip port $server_port:
+ $@";

    }
[download]

Another is to have 1 IRC thr per brain prog (if you haven't got too many) and do the same.
Either try to re-connect from the thr that has a dead cxn, or get it to mark a thr shared hash (%brains) that the cxn is dead, then terminate naturally and get the controlling thr to initiate a new thr to connect to the brain prog.
The latter might be pref, as you'll prob have to reset any thr private vars anyway.

Cheers
Chris