PLANS FOR a 100 bed community nursing unit in Ennis are to be lodged by the HSE next month.
Fresh from an allocation of €1.05m in the HSE’s Capital Plan for 2022 for St Joseph’s Hospital, a planning application is to be lodged by the end of June for a new one hundred bed unit in Ennis. The facility is intended to be used by patients requiring long-term care and rehabilitation.
In July 2019, the HSE purchased a five acre site for €25m as part of plans to replace St Joseph’s Hospital with the intention of having the unit operational by 2021 and located on lands previously owned by the Killaloe Diocese in Turnpike.
Clare TD, Michael McNamara (IND) told The Clare Echo that the rehab set to be provided in the new community nursing unit will aid patients from all over the county and could potentially create additional capacity to ease pressures on University Hospital Limerick (UHL) and Ennis Hospital.
He said of the announcement, “It’s very positive, it’s overdue but very positive news. The fact we’re going to build it on a greenfield site means it will be significant”.
Deputy McNamara acknowledged that Ennis was already set to benefit from a soon to be opened primary care centre on Station Rd. “We have huge waiting lists and we need to treat as many people as possible outside of UHL”.
False dawns have occurred on many occasions in the past with regards to aspirations for new health services and centres in Clare but the Scariff native was hopeful an application would be lodged swiftly by the HSE. “I’ve been told by people in HSE it will go to planning quite soon, I’ll believe it when I see planning application, I believed there is a desire and a hope to make application this summer”.
