United front formed to save Sligo services

MEDICAL EXPERTS in the northwest, who recently warned the Minister for Health that breast cancer survival figures could worsen if the service was transferred from Sligo General Hospital (SGH), are attending a unique think tank in Sligo tonight.

Although a series of well-publicised protests have highlighted local opposition to the proposed transfer, it has emerged that medical staff have also made a series of submissions to the Minister and the HSE which they believe have been ignored.

The Save Sligo Cancer Services lobby group has invited a range of local medical and support staff to tonight's meeting to make a united approach to the authorities. Spokesman Killian McLoughlin said it would be "highly irresponsible" for the HSE and the Minister to ignore the collective experience and expertise of these medical professionals.

"They will be presenting evidence, not hearsay," he said.

Mr McLoughlin said if the Government continued to ignore "proven statistics", plans had already been set in motion to make a case to the petitions committee of the European Parliament and to launch a court challenge.

Among those due to attend tonight's meeting are two consultants based at SGH, breast surgeon Mr Tim O'Hanrahan and oncologist Dr Michael Martin who have already warned the Minister that the move is likely to result in poorer survival figures.

In a letter to the Minister, dated June 10th last, the consultants pointed out that while breast cancer survival figures in Ireland were poor, ranking just 21st out of 38 European countries on a par with Macedonia and the Czech Republic, the figures in Sligo were as good as those in the US which rank the best in the world.

On that basis they argued that it was most unlikely that there would be any improvement in outcomes if the service was transferred out of SGH.

The consultants also argued that in the current financial climate that it was "most unlikely" that the necessary resources would be allocated to designated centres to cope with the increased patient load. "This will result in standards not being kept, delays in both the diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer and, as a result, poorer survival figures."

And they suggested that it would be "very wasteful" to allocate significant funding to a designated centre "so that it will achieve results that are already being achieved at SGH".

Stressing the importance of effective screening, the letter raised concerns about the effectiveness of Breast Check. The consultants quoted a survey which suggests there was no increase in the number of early stage breast cancers detected in the eastern region from 2000 to 2005. A national roll-out of the Breast Check programme in its current format would, therefore, have no impact on national breast cancer survival figures, they concluded.

Management at SGH made a number of submissions to the authorities in December, April and May last on the plan to transfer breast cancer services to University Hospital Galway.

The April submission included a study by Dr Martin detailing how survival rates in SGH were as good as and, in some categories, better than those achieved in the United States.

Dr Martin said to date no one had produced evidence to show that outcomes for Sligo patients would be improved by removing their care "from a centre that is, at worst, meeting the survival standards in the US and, at best, may even be surpassing them, to an already overstretched tertiary referral hospital".

The submissions pointed out that there were 93 newly diagnosed breast cancers at SGH in 2007, up from 76 in 2006. The local lobby group has accused Mary Harney of being "disingenuous" in repeatedly quoting the 2004 figure of 53.

The May submission which put forward a number of options which would allow the services to remain in Sligo, expressed concerns from a hospital perspective about the ability of cancer centres in Galway and Dublin to accommodate 1,000 additional outpatients and subsequent inpatients from the SGH catchment area.

The Minister also received a letter from the Co Sligo GP Society in April which described the plan to transfer the service as "unjust and undemocratic". It argued that the plan risked compromising rather than enhancing the care patients would get.

Among those attending tonight's meeting - which is barred to politicians - will be representatives of the Irish Cancer Society, the Irish Patients' Association, the INO, the Co Sligo GP Society, staff from the local hospice and specialist staff from SGH.

Mr McLoughin said that former Tánaiste and EU commissioner Ray MacSharry had undertaken to ensure that the report compiled tonight would be presented directly to Minister Mary Harney and to the director of the National Cancer Control Programme, Prof Tom Keane, and the HSE chief executive, Prof Brendan Drumm.

Mr MacSharry had recently advocated that the medical experts come together to make the case for SGH arguing that it was a medical rather than a political issue.

Local Fianna Fáil TDs had been the subject of considerable local anger when they voted against a recent Dáil motion calling for the retention of the services in Sligo and Castlebar hospitals.