APPROVAL for a €9.95m theatre upgrade at Ennis Hospital has been confirmed by the HSE.
A capital budget allocation to the tune of €9.95m for Ennis Hospital has been confirmed by UL Hospitals Group CEO, Colette Cowan. The project has already progressed to the design stage.
Ms Cowan released the detail in response to representations by Clare TD, Michael McNamara (IND) on theatre utilisation rates at Ennis Hospital, University Hospital Limerick (UHL), Nenagh Hospital and St. John’s Hospital during the pandemic.
Deputy McNamara outlined, “While I very much welcome this long-awaited investment in theatre facilities in Ennis, I would like to see the project accelerated as figures given to me confirm the HSE’s pandemic response disproportionately impacted theatre usage at Ennis Hospital compared to other hospitals within the UL Hospitals Group”.
2,021 procedures were carried out in Ennis during 2019, but this figure dropped by 56% to 897 in 2021. This compares to a 40% reduction at Nenagh Hospital (3,392 to 2,029), a 25% reduction at St. John’s Hospital in Limerick (4,091 to 3,086) and an 8% reduction in UHL (10,708 to 9,869) for the same periods.
Reduction in theatre usage at Ennis has been attributed to the redeployment of staff at UHL to support critical care and emergency care during the pandemic but a shortage of available anaesthetists and theatre nurses across the UL Hospitals Group also is a likely contributory factor.
An increase in theatre capacity and usage levels needs to become the primary method to reduce the excessive backlog built up over the past two years, Deputy McNamara said. “Professor Brian Lenehan, the Chief Clinical Director of the UL Hospitals Group told a meeting of Clare County Council in December that the two theatres at Ennis Hospital would predominately continue to be for day-care surgery. Considering the excessive waiting lists in the Midwest, I would ask the UL Hospitals Group to revisit its position and consider late evening and overnight surgical cases at Ennis which would necessitate a reclassification of Ennis as a Model 3 Hospital.”
In a written response to Deputy McNamara’s questions on theatre usage in the Midwest, UL Hospitals Group CEO Collete Cowan said, “Virtual clinics are being used across our services as a means of identifying patients who can be progressed to in-person treatment, whether for diagnostic imaging, minor procedures, or full episodes of care”.
She continued, “The HSE has established a Scheduled Care Transformation Programme to ensure a sustained, system-wide transformation process that tackles the challenge of scheduled care waiting times, improves access to scheduled care services, and ensures the safe delivery of care in the context of the on-going pandemic”.
Former Clare TD, James Breen (IND) who campaigned for Ennis Hospital for forty years told The Clare Echo the announcement is positive but insisted more could be done. “It is very good news but there is a but in it, our TDs should lobby and lobby hard for a model three hospital in Ennis, it has been proven he last three or four years with overcrowding in UHL. The money is welcome and it is welcome to see it spent in Ennis Hospital but it is not enough”.
