“INAPPROPRIATE admission” to hospitals is a major contributory factor to the current problems in public healthcare, a senior Health Service Executive (HSE) director said last night in Galway.
Speaking at the fifth Irish Times/Pfizer health debate, HSE director for quality, safety and risk Dr Joe Devlin said that the current situation faced by many patients in public hospitals was "not acceptable".
However, providing more beds was “not the answer” when the beds available were not being used properly, Dr Devlin said.
Dr Devlin was speaking against the motion that “this house believes that Ireland has insufficient bed capacity to meet our healthcare needs”. Also speaking against was Paul Pierotti, PA Consulting head of health and author of a report for the HSE on bed capacity published in January, 2008.
Speakers for the motion were Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) deputy general secretary, David Hughes, and Irish Hospital Consultants’ Association (IHCA) assistant general secretary Donal Duffy.
The debate in NUI Galway (NUIG) was chaired by Irish Timesassistant editor Fintan O'Toole.
Mr Hughes (INO) recalled that a report published by former minister for health Micheál Martin in 2002 had forecast the need for an additional 3,000 acute beds and 10,000 continuing care beds by 2011.
Subsequent reports, such as the PA Consulting report commissioned by HSE, had estimated that the service could manage with between 2,000 and 5,000 less beds, provided that an integrated health service was initiated, Mr Hughes said.
The INO deputy general secretary questioned how such figures could differ, and noted that some 10 to 12 casualty departments were in “constant crisis” with people waiting up to 36 hours for a bed.
The motion was carried on a show of hands. A full report on the debate will be published in The Irish TimesHealthPlus supplement next week.