Tanaiste Leo Varadkar has said that downgrading the Midlands Regional Hospital in Portlaoise isn’t on the agenda – and that a HSE proposal from 2017 to reduce the A&E hours won’t be acted upon.
Varadkar was speaking during a visit to Laois today when he visited Greenfield Global and Glanbia in Portlaoise as well as the Webmill Digital Hub in Mountmellick, from where he attended an online meeting of the Fine Gael Parliamentary party.
“There aren’t plans to downgrade the hospital,” he said.
“I know that has been talked about and proposed and been rumoured. The view that I have is the view that I’ve always had. With an expanding population in Laois you could only do something like that if you were to put major investment into Naas or Tallaght.
“And that would cost a fortune for a start and it would take many years to do it. And you would do it against a backdrop where you have a rising population in Laois.
“It’s a long time since an emergency department in Ireland has been closed. It’s seven or eight years at this stage.
“And while hospitals evolve over time in terms of services that they offer, I don’t see and I’ve never seen it that downgrading Portlaoise is a solution.
“You’d need mega investment in Naas and Tallaght, you’d make the situation much worse there.”
The Tanaiste referenced his own local hospital in Blanchardstown and how suggestions to limit the services in Navan would make the situation in Blanchardstown worse.
“It’s something I’m familiar with in my own constituency. We have Connolly Hospital in Blanchardstown which is a really well-performing hospital. It doesn’t have the problems with trolleys and overcrowding to the extent of others do and it’s often proposed that the emergency departments in Navan should be closed.
“And I know exactly what would happen. It would have a major increase in patients attending Drogheda and Connolly, two hospitals that are performing well not being able to cope any more.
“There is an illogic there to reducing services in Portlaoise.”
He added that the issue of recruiting consultants is a considerable challenge at the moment.
“What we do have a real problem with is recruiting suitably qualified doctors and a lot of that relates to the consultant contract.
“I hope we can make progress on that in the next couple of months to make those jobs much more attractive. Because it is hard to get consultants to take posts in smaller hospitals.
“There are a lot of reasons for that but if we can make it more attractive I think that would make a big difference in patient safety issues and quality of care.”
“It’s absolutely essential that services remain in Portlaoise as they have been over the past number of years,” added Laois-Offaly TD Charlie Flanagan who accompanied the Tanaiste.
“Overcrowding in hospitals like Limerick can undoubtedly be attributed to reconfiguration that took place in that region not too far from here that saw the reduction if not closure of the accident and emergency in Nenagh
“We can learn lessons from that in ensuring that we have adequate services. We are a growing county. The hospital is serving more people than ever so I don’t see any downgrade on the agenda.”
Is that 2017 proposal now off the table entirely then, the Tanaiste was asked.
“That’s a couple of years ago. The Government and the HSE decided not to proceed with that. That is not to say that hospital services don’t evolve over time. Emergency medicine is very different than it used to be.”
