A Co Offaly company has manufactured the State's first specially designed ambulance to transport newborn babies who are in a critical condition to maternity hospitals in Dublin.
Wilker Auto Conversions, based in Clara, built the ambulance, which can provide the same facilities for babies that are available in a hospital's intensive care unit, while the vehicle transports a baby to Dublin from another hospital in the State.
Mr Greg Kerrigan, the company's sales and technical director, said the vehicle was the first of its type in the State and the UK.
The ambulance and its incubators and other equipment cost about €254,000, said Ms Helen Byrne, co-ordinator of the National Neonatal Transport Programme.
The programme, in which the ambulance is a central feature, has been in operation since March last year, but was formally unveiled last week by the Minister for Health, Mr Martin.
Special care is needed to transport newborn babies, according to international research.
The need to develop such a service has been recognised among paediatricians for more than 20 years, Prof Tom Clarke of the Rotunda Hospital, who is part of the programme's committee, wrote in the programme's recently published interim report.
A study showed that 14 per cent of babies (24 out of 172) transferred to Dublin maternity hospitals from 1987 to June 1989 died. However, there have also been advances in neonatal care in the past decade.
Since the programme's inception, two infants have died out of a total of 174 transferred. The infants, who were critically ill, died after they were transferred, said Ms Byrne.
Outside the main urban centres included in the Southern Health Board and the Eastern Regional Health Authority, the Midland Health Board (MHB) has in the past year had the highest number of transports of babies.
Ms Byrne said the ambulance, which is stationed at St James's Hospital, Dublin, would be mobilised 40 minutes after it received a call from a hospital anywhere in the State.
Prof Clarke, in the programme's interim report, said the problems that existed previously were due to a consultant either having to leave the hospital unattended while a critically ill infant was transferred, or in some cases having no alternative but to allow such ill infants be accompanied by inadequately experienced staff.
The service is provided by the Coombe Women's Hospital, the National Maternity Hospital, the Rotunda Hospital and the Eastern Regional Ambulance Service. It is funded by the health boards.
The interim report said the five main components of the neonatal transport service were: the vehicles and their response time; equipment and supplies; the transport team; the communication network between hospitals; and education.
Mr Kerrigan said a group of neonatal transport personnel from Scotland and England came to the State last year to see the ambulance and equipment and had since had similar machines built for their regions.