Sir, – As I retire from working as a doctor shortly (and having previously worked in the Coombe Hospital), one of the big disappointments I have is that when the National Children’s Hospital (NCH) opens its doors within the next few years on the campus of St James’s Hospital there will still be mothers delivering high-risk babies in the Coombe (and in other maternity units) who will need to be transferred immediately after birth to the NCH but who ideally should have been born on the site of the NCH.
Pregnant women with acute medical or surgical problems transferred to St James’s Hospital from the Coombe (and from other maternity units) will still not have access to appropriate on-site obstetrical services.
It is of note that the new National Maternity Hospital (NMH) that will be built on the campus of St Vincent’s Hospital will not have on-site access to the type and range of tertiary paediatric services that will be in the NCH.
This is all the more reason for there to be at least one medical campus in the whole of the country with a comprehensive range of on-site tertiary adult, paediatric, and obstetrical services.
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Located in different parts of the city, the billions spent on the NCH and a new NMH will not join these dots up.
It’s even more disappointing as there is no prospect that the Coombe will ever move to St James’s Hospital – space, money, and lack of political support being the issues.
History, however, offers a glimmer of hope. St James’s Hospital used to have its own small maternity unit until it was transferred to the Coombe in 1987.
As the largest adult hospital in the State and with ambitious plans and considerable corporate punching power, perhaps St James’s Hospital could seriously consider re-establishing a small maternity unit of its own - this time for high-risk pregnancies – next door to the NCH in the interests of mothers and babies
Knowing how the system works, if St James’s doesn’t do it, my bet is it will never be done. – Yours, etc,
CHRIS FITZPATRICK,
Dublin 6.