New regional hospital to be built in northeast

A new regional acute hospital will be built to serve the northeast region following a recommendation in a report published by the Health Service Executive today.

Brendan Drumm CEO, Health Service Executive speaking at the launch of the Cancer Strategy report on Monday.

The location of the new facility is still to be decided but it is expected to be fully operational by 2015.

The report, carried out by Teamwork Management Services, said the present system, whereby five local hospitals in the region deliver acute care to a small catchment area was exposing patients to increased risk.

"These small populations are not generating enough emergency work to justify a full team of consultants on the doorstep and if such a team were to placed in such circumstances they would progressively lose their skills due to lack of work," it said.

But the report which was commissioned after an elderly patient bled to death in Monaghan General Hospital last October claimed the difficulties in the northeast were largely a reflection of the shortcomings in the hospital system itself - "the way it is organised and how services are distributed".

The region has five acute hospitals - Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, Cavan General Hospital, Monaghan General Hospital, Our Lady's Hospital in Navan and the Louth County Hospital in Dundalk.

The report recommends the development of local services by the existing five hospitals and primary and community care providers and binding these local and regional services together through a series of clinical networks.

It calls for the delivery of minor emergency, planned, diagnostic and other services in local hospitals, to ensure that most care is delivered as close to home as possible.

The CEO of the HSE Professor Brendan Drumm said the report made it clear that members of the public were not being well served by the hospital system in the area as it stands.

"However, it does highlight that there is an unprecedented opportunity to develop a very high quality responsive service that meets the needs of the whole community equally, and is based on the best models of health care in the world.

"We would not be serving the community if we maintained the status quo or simply poured valuable resources into what is obviously a structure which needs to be tailored to meet the needs of patients."

Prof Drumm said the plan was a blueprint for the development of healthcare nationally.

He said there would be no diminution in existing services but instead an alternative model of care would provide more comprehensive services.

The report was commissioned in the wake of the outcry last October when Patrick Joseph Walsh (75) bled to death in Monaghan General Hospital.

He required emergency surgery on a bleeding ulcer but could not be operated on in Monaghan as surgeons there are not permitted to do emergency surgery.

The HSE said it would set up a North East Steering Group and a Project Director to review and implement the report's recommendations.

The first item the group will deal with will be to act promptly on the report's recommendations to improve patient safety in the immediate term.