Madam, - As a paediatrician, appointed to the Rotunda and Temple Street Hospitals in 1978, I have been fortunate to have been involved in many positive developments in the services available for sick children. The past 30 years have seen the introduction of intensive care, the ability to generate DNA/amino-acid profiles from tiny blood samples and non-invasive imaging (MRI, CT, ultrasound) all improving the care available to children so that our infant mortality rate (IMR) for the past few years has been five or less.
This low infant mortality rate - unbelievable in past decades - places us ahead of most first-world countries (except northern Scandinavia) and should be of an immense source of pride to us all, given our large wedge of socially deprived people, smokers, drug users and recently arrived immigrant Irish parents. These improved outcomes have been achieved on the back of often scarce or uncertain funding and have been largely medically driven by better antenatal foetal assessment, neonatal and paediatric intensive care, vaccinations and SIDS risk reduction guidelines.
Almost the only blot on an otherwise immensely satisfying medical career was the continuous internecine trench warfare between the children's hospitals which has been a constant background factor with each side lining up support among the Department of Health, local politicians, ex-patients, parents, etc, making it impossible to remain neutral while working in either children's hospital.
In the light of this unending institutional dog-fight, seeing the "bigger picture" can prove well nigh impossible, making Prof Brendan Drumm's genuinely principled belief in a single tertiary children's hospital, in the face of the opposition of many of his former colleagues, all the more remarkable.
I am not taking a high moral position on the siting of the national children's hospital, as I would have been disappointed had it gone to St James's Hospital, but I hope that I would have had my ex-colleague's ability to focus on the bigger picture and accept it.
Looking at the immense achievements of Irish paediatrics over the past 30 years it would be a sad irony if this promising cub of Ireland's much abused tiger was to be stillborn. - Yours, etc,
Prof TOM MATTHEWS, UCD Professor of Paediatrics, The Children's University Hospital, Temple Street, Dublin 1.
Madam, - Having considered various locations for the new National Children's Hospital in Dublin, I wish to propose that it be sited in the Phoenix Park close to Parkgate Street.
The advantages of this site are numerous, for example:
easy access to Heuston Station and to the Luas line;
unused train line from Connolly Station;
a short drive to the M50 via the Castleknock gate
easy access to the city centre, the northside and southside.
I realise that an Act of the Oireachtas is required to change the use of even a small proportion of the Phoenix Park, but this should not be a major issue. In fact, if the HSE were to surrender its very old St Mary's Hospital site back to the park authorities, there would be little or no reduction in public space at the Park.
The only possible disadvantage is the lack of a major adult hospital beside Parkgate Street. This should not be critical, however. After all, the National Children's Hospital in Crumlin has thrived for many years without an adjacent adult hospital.- Yours, etc,
WILLIAM C RYAN, St Brendan's Park, Artane, Dublin 5.