University Hospital Limerick surgical hub
Maurice Quinlivan says trolley numbers at University Hospital Limerick remain high and seeks full funding for its surgical hub. The Taoiseach cites €47 million in investment and management reforms but gives no assurance that the requested funding will be provided.
As the Taoiseach knows, a new 96-bed unit was opened in University Hospital Limerick, UHL, last October. That was very welcome, but it has not addressed the issues at the hospital in the way that some people had forecast. To date, 7,554 people have been on trolleys in UHL. That is a reduction of less than 2% on what was seen last year despite opening that 96-bed unit. UHL has doubled the number of people who attend the hospital in Waterford, which has more consultants, and good luck to it. UHL needs a lot more to be done. One of the small pieces of fixing the jigsaw of the health service in the mid-west region was opening the surgical hub. That was due to open next month but has been delayed until December. That is not the worst thing that could have happened. The worst thing is that it was designed to deal with 20,000-plus day cases, which would take people out of UHL and helped to alleviate the issues there. The real kicker here is-----
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-----that we heard from the HSE on Monday that it is only getting 50% of the budget for the surgical hub.
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I am asking the Taoiseach to intervene and make sure that the HSE Mid West gets the 100% of funding it needs to open the new surgical hub.
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The Minister is very committed to the surgical hub concept. The previous Minister, Stephen Donnelly, did a lot of work on that. The Minister, Deputy Carroll MacNeill, has engaged with the hospital, and the funding support will not be there for the surgical hub.
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There has also been significant investment in the hospital, as the Deputy knows, and-----
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The surgical hub will not be open. The hospital will not have the money.
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The Minister has had regular engagement with the hospital because it needs two fundamental approaches. One is reform of the management of the hospital and how it is run, both of which have happened,. The second is investment, which is also happening. Funding of €47 million is involved. In any event, the new location in Raheen is a huge boost to the future of tertiary healthcare in Limerick.