The Public Accounts Committee has recalled Children’s Health Ireland (CHI) and the Health Service Executive (HSE) to appear before it amid “growing concerns” about what its chairman claims is an “omission of vital information” during a recent appearance.
The committee, which seeks to ensure Government financial accountability and transparency, has also called on the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) to come before it.
The decision to recall the bodies follows revelations that a CHI consultant was allegedly referring patients from the public system to his own weekend clinics he runs separately.
These clinics received funding from the NTPF, which seeks to reduce waiting lists in the State.
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Sinn Féin TD John Brady, chairman of the committee, said “the public has a right to expect accountability at every level of our health system, especially where public money and patient care are concerned”.
“This is not just about one consultant – it is about the systems and oversight mechanisms that allowed this to happen," he said.
Meanwhile, the Minister for Health announced she has appointed Dr Yvonne Traynor and Anne Carrigy to the board of CHI to strengthen governance and oversight in the organisation.
The body, which operates paediatric healthcare in the State, has faced significant upheaval after four board members resigned over the past week. The board’s chairman, Jim Browne, resigned last month.
The resignations followed two reviews that highlighted issues within the group’s paediatric orthopaedic units. One focused on three children with scoliosis who were implanted with non-surgical springs, while the other found the vast majority of surgeries for developmental dysplasia of the hip (DDH) in two hospitals were unnecessary.
Another report, by UK expert Selvadurai Nayagam, into paediatric orthopaedic surgery services is ongoing.
Minister Jennifer Carroll MacNeill said the appointments will “further support the extensive transformation programme, led by CHI chief executive Lucy Nugent and her team, as we move to open the state-of-the-art children’s hospital which will be Ireland’s first digital public hospital”.
Dr Traynor, who has been a HSE board member since 2019, was previously vice-president of regulatory and scientific affairs with Kerry Group.
Ms Carrigy, who joined the HSE board in March 2021, previously worked as director of the HSE’s serious incident management team. She later became the national lead of acute hospital services.
Further appointments to fill vacancies on the CHI board will be made in due course, the Department of Health said.
