The former private hospital site at Mount Carmel in Dublin is to be the site of one of the six new surgical hubs planned by the HSE to tackle waiting list for day procedures.
Speaking at Galway University Hospital on Friday, Stephen Donnelly said renovation work is underway at the hospital, which was purchased in 2014 and has been used for most of the intervening time for step down care, and the intention is to have the facility open before the end of 2023.
He said the locations of three of the five other hubs planned have been decided with Cork and Waterford University Hospitals to host those built in the cities while Merlin Park University Hospital in Galway will be another of the sites.
Work is continuing, the Minister for Health said, on finalising the locations of the hubs in North Dublin and Limerick.
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Mr Donnelly said the hiring staff required to operate the centres, which are modelled on an existing one at Tallaght hospital, is also being sanctioned in an attempt to facilitate shorter schedules for opening.
The hubs in North Dublin, Cork and Galway and Waterford will be modular builds, something he said would also cut delivery times for the facilities.
The intention to build the new centres was reported in December when Cabinet approval was received. The hubs will focus on high volume surgeries like urology, vascular surgery, orthopaedics, gynaecology and ophthalmology. The investment involved was put at around €100 million at the time.
“These surgical hubs are a rapid measure of tackling the waiting lists,” said Mr Donnelly.
“We’re basing them on the surgical hub at Tallaght University Hospital which it has four operating theatres and then facilities for day case surgery surgery.
“What Tallaght found was the use of this centre led to at 91 per cent reduction in the number of patients waiting for day case surgery for longer than three months; it’s been hugely effective. And really, that’s the kind of impact that we want to see here in Galway, and right across right across the country.”
The Minister said the hubs were one part of a wide ranging and ambitious programme of infrastructural investment at sites across the country including Galway University Hospital.
He said the projects would help the HSE to improve services and tackle waiting lists but echoed the comments of that organisation’s chief executive, Bernard Gloster who said on Thursday that the health service needed to operate at something far closer to weekday capacity every day, something that will require the rolling out of seven day rosters for many staff who have not previously routinely worked weekends.
“The normal patient services operate Monday to Friday but patients get sick, patients need to be seen, treated, scanned, discharged seven days a week. service,” said Mr Donnelly. “So one of the way in which we will reduce waiting lists is to move to a seven day service. And this combination of increased capacity and reform is how we will deliver the goal of universal healthcare.
Asked about the controversy this week over the newspaper article in which three Fine Gael Ministers of State called for specific tax breaks to be included in the budget, Mr Donnelly said that everyone could be “susceptible to the temptation to fly kites but I think we have to give Paschal Donohoe and Michael McGrath the space they need.
“Obviously I’ll be pitching for a significant investment in healthcare, both in terms of infrastructure and services but I think we need to leave the two Ministers the space to put the budget together.
“Counterintuitively, they have a very difficult job this year because there is so much funding coming in, but it is one off funding.”
Separately, Mr Donnelly confirmed that a report by The Ditch that he had recently driven his car while it was untaxed was accurate. “Yeah, absolutely, I didn’t see that that was the situation but once I was made aware of it, I rectified it.”
