The family of the late Pat Joe Walsh said last night, after seeing the report, that he had been given "no chance at all".
Edward Walsh, a nephew of the dead man, said that on the night Pat Joe died he urgently needed a transfer to another hospital but was not afforded that transfer.
"We were very distressed to learn that another patient was transferred out of Monaghan that night," he said. "There was a continued failure on the part of management over a long period of time to address hospital issues, which led to our uncle's death," he added.
"Between the consultants and issues of process and policy, Pat Joe was given no chance at all. Care of our uncle as a patient was not the priority that night," he continued.
Furthermore, he said, the Walsh family feel we do not have a proper health service. "What's in place is segments of a health service that don't work together for the good of the patient."
Minister for Health Mary Harney and assistant national director of the HSE's National Hospitals Office Dr Mary Hynes apologised to the Walsh family for the circumstances in which Pat Joe died.
"The manner in which Mr Pat Joe Walsh died in Monaghan General Hospital on October 14th, 2005 cannot be without consequences," Ms Harney said. "The independent report details an intolerable breach of acceptable patient care by not ensuring his transfer from Monaghan to either Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda, or Cavan General Hospital.
"It identified a shocking level of dysfunction embedded in the day-to-day operation of hospitals in the northeast. The absence of co-operation and lack of solidarity among some clinicians in the northeast and between some clinicians and management has put patients at risk," she added.
She warned that patient safety "will be put at risk" unless there is speedy implementation of the recommendations in the report. "I have requested a monthly report from the HSE on the measures being taken to ensure better patient care in the northeast. I intend to forward these reports to the Oireachtas Health Committee," she added.
Dr Hynes said there were now clear protocols for the transfer of patients.
The recommendation in the report that all acute services be withdrawn from Monaghan hospital outraged local independent TD Paudge Connolly. He warned that more patients in Monaghan would die if they had to travel long distances for emergency treatment. Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD said the decision to take further services out of Monaghan was disastrous.