Fine Gael TD for Galway West and Mayo South Seán Kyne has welcomed clarification from the Minister for Health, Leo Varadkar that the 30 new beds for UHG’s emergency department are on course to open later this month.
Minister Varadkar also confirmed that the new emergency department will go to design and planning stage in 2016 in his response to questions from Deputy Kyne in the Dáil. This year there are 689 new staff across the Saolta Hospital Group with 38 having been assigned to emergency departments.
Hospitals have also been given the power to deploy or redeploy staff within each hospital to meet increased demands on services.
“The thirty new beds for the emergency department on course to open this month, or in January at the latest, will help reduce overcrowding and improve conditions for patients as well as staff,” ,” said Deputy Kyne.
“The INMO’s figures show that there were few people on trolleys in UHG in November of this year than at the same time last year which, as the Minister pointed out, is due in part to the extra 14 beds that have opened in Merlin Park Hospital. I further welcome clarification from Minister Varadkar that the Capital Plan for Health is focusing on national projects such as the New Children’s Hospital, and that the upgrade of UHG’s emergency department will proceed irrespective of the contents of the Capital Plan.
“As Minister Varadkar emphasised in his replies to my questions improving accident and emergency care is linked to wider improvements in the hospital in general. These improvements are being brought about with additional staff, the 30 new beds on the site of old physiotherapy and social work department, and through the construction of the new 75 bed facility on the UHG campus,” he concluded.
