The head of the Health Service Executive's National Hospitals Office is to leave his post and return to work as an adviser to HSE chief executive Prof Brendan Drumm.
The Irish Timeshas learned that John O'Brien, who was a central figure in the recent breast cancer controversy at the Midlands Regional Hospital in Portlaoise, will return within weeks to his previous role as a strategic adviser to the chief executive.
Mr O'Brien, who had been heading the National Hospitals Office on a temporary basis since early 2006, originally joined the HSE on secondment from St James's Hospital, where he was chief executive.
A spokeswoman for the HSE said last night that Mr O'Brien "will shortly return to his full-time role as adviser to the CEO on a range of strategic issues".
"Planning towards this end has been ongoing since last summer in the context of the implementation of a national model for integrated care delivery that will allow the HSE to develop shared care between primary care and hospital services as envisaged in the organisation's transformation programme".
Asked whether Mr O'Brien's return to the CEO's office was linked to the events in Portlaoise, the spokeswoman said this was most definitely not the case as a role change was being planned since last July.
As director of the National Hospitals Office, Mr O'Brien unexpectedly revealed details of a second review of women with symptoms of breast cancer, and who had undergone ultrasound scans at Portlaoise hospital, to the Oireachtas Committee on Health and Children last November.
It subsequently emerged that neither the women themselves, nor Minister for Health Mary Harney nor Prof Drumm, were aware of this review prior to Mr O'Brien's statement to the committee.
The problems at the midland hospital emerged last August when it was decided to initiate a review of all breast diagnostic services, including mammography and ultrasounds, carried out at the hospital between November 2003 and August 2007.
A review of mammograms was performed by Dr Ann O'Doherty, a specialist breast radiologist, but it subsequently emerged that, unknown to the Department of Health, a separate review of ultrasounds was being conducted by a consultant surgeon at a local level. Dr O'Doherty's review of 3,000 mammograms found that nine women with breast cancer were wrongly given the all-clear.
A report on the matter is expected in the coming weeks.