Over fifty consultants and GPs in the northeast — angry at the Health Service Executive’s (HSE) proposed service cutbacks in the area — have formed an advocacy group and are demanding the HSE consult with them over any changes in the region that will impact on patient care.
At a meeting in Monaghan last week organised by local GP and Irish Medical Times columnist, Dr Illona Duffy, doctors were furious over the proposed cutbacks, dubbed the ‘5 into 2’ strategy, which had been revealed in a leaked HSE memo, which the HSE has since said is simply a planning document.
The memo revealed that acute services would be closed in Monaghan, Navan and Dundalk hospitals and transferred to Drogheda and Cavan, and surgery and OPD clinics be reduced by up to 25 per cent.
“Throughout the planning and implementation of changes in the delivery of healthcare in the region, doctors have been and continue to be excluded from the consultative process,” Dr Duffy said.
They agreed to form a group called North-East Clinicians (NEC) and plan to “take up the task of fighting changes that will impact on safe and effective healthcare provision in the region”.
Consultants at the meeting said they were “strongly discouraged” from commenting publicly or criticising the HSE, and that they continue to face the daily challenge of “trying to tend to acutely-ill patients on trolleys in corridors, to discharge inpatients as early as possible to free up beds and to watch as patients deteriorate while on lengthy waiting lists”.
About Gary Culliton
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