Madam, – My 82-year-old mother was recently admitted to the Mater hospital, Dublin for major surgery. My sisters and I have been travelling from Louth, Cork, Wicklow and Dublin on a daily basis to visit her. Our major difficulty relates to the inaccessibility of the Mater hospital to those travelling from outside Dublin, and the very inadequate parking facilities around the hospital. We have resorted to parking at Mum’s place in Sandymount and commuting by taxi at great expense and inconvenience.
We now know how unsuitable this location is for the national children’s hospital of Ireland. We must not foist this unnecessary stress and expense on parents of sick children in the future. A more suitable site must be selected without further delay. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – In recent newspaper articles Maurice Neligan has noted that he has changed his mind about the suitability of the chosen Mater site for the national children’s hospital and has stated that he is no longer convinced that the best interests of sick children constituted the dominant consideration in the site selection process.
In a response, Louis Roden (August 4th) argues that all relevant factors have already been properly and professionally evaluated – when choosing the Mater site – and he urges Maurice Neligan to let sleeping dogs lie lest the project be further delayed.
I should declare a personal vested interest. I am the project manager for Noel Smyth’s proposal to locate the hospital at Newlands Cross. Perhaps it is worth noting that our entire team (of designers and contractors) have offered their services on a not-for-profit basis.
I am convinced that a review should be undertaken of the selection process. Clearly I do not know what the outcome of such a review would be, but I am convinced that if a demonstrable primacy is placed on the best interests of sick children then everybody involved will accept the outcome with an easier heart.
I have set out four examples below of what are in my view deficiencies in the previous site selection process.
1. Accessibility appears to have been a primary selection criterion. However the accessibility audits carried out to date do not appear to have given sufficient weight to “patient arrivals” (normally by car, taxi or ambulance) versus visitor arrivals (often by public transport). This is a tertiary hospital and so all thinking needs to focus on patient welfare. A politically correct emphasis on public transport accessibility should not constitute a primary criterion. Also it appears that insufficient regard has been given to the fact that about 70 per cent of patient arrivals will be from outside Dublin and that a landmark location at the edge of the city provides obvious benefits.
2. The benefits arising from co-location are well established. However an evidence-based assessment of the relative merits of co-location with a maternity hospital versus an adult teaching hospital should now be prepared as there is a lack of professional consensus in this regard.
3. It appears that no cognisance has been taken to date of the environmental benefits for patients of a leafy suburban location versus the hard urban context of the Mater.
4. In current economic conditions it is surely necessary to obtain value for money in all such projects. However, it seems that, to date, no evaluation credit has been given to the Newlands option for the 25-30 per cent cost savings it offers (which might amount to a €150 million saving).
I understand from recent newspaper reports that the Mater proposal will shortly be submitted for planning.
This creates a natural hiatus for the project which would allow a new transparent and comprehensive site selection process to occur. Surely, given the widely divergent but honestly-held views on the validity of the process to date, it is now appropriate and indeed necessary to follow the course of action. – Yours, etc,