The author of a book detailing the fight by cancer patients to keep St Luke's hospital in Rathgar open has criticised Minister for Health Mary Harney today.
Enid O'Dowd, who is today launching her book Cancer in a Cold Climate: The Shafting of St Luke's Hospital, condemned Ms Harney for not consulting patients with experience of the hospitals.
"Mary Harney says she has to close it because experts advised her," said Ms O'Dowd. "She says it is all about patients and best outcome for patients, but she's never, ever consulted patients to make this decision."
The book maintains if patients had been consulted, they would not have advised that services be transferred away.
Ms Harney has insisted the move of cancer services out of St Luke's hospital was based on clinical criteria. "The advice is that it's better to integrate radiation oncology with surgical services, rather than having stand-alone facilities," she explained.
St Luke's currently provides one of these stand-alone radiation oncology services, but by 2014 it will have those services integrated into a new cancer centre co-located with St. James's hospital in Dublin 8.
One of the primary complaints by the Save St Luke's group is that its 18 acre site provides a more patient-friendly hospital than St James's. While "baffled" by the decision to chose St James's over St Luke's, Ms O'Dowd believes the issue of accessibility shows where a divide can appear between experts and patients.
"James's possibly has more public transport to it, but when you are talking about cancer patients, public transport is not that relative. Most cancer patients are tired, they are a bit run down, but they would get to the hospital by car so car parking would be a much bigger issue than public transport," she said, adding "James's is chock-a-block with cars. It has very expensive car parking charges . . . Luke's has ample parking and it's free."
While Ms Harney has promised St Luke's site will not be sold off and will be used for health services, Mrs O'Dowd expressed concern over its future. "I would be worried about her language . . . you wonder what she means by health services" said Ms O'Dowd.
Chairman of Save St Luke's Joe Guilfoyle said he hoped the publication of the book by Ms O'Dowd will raise awareness about the issue and, he hopes, lead to a public outcry. "We want to take back the site from the HSE, and we want it to be done quickly because if they put too much money into the transfer we feel like it will be very difficult then to do so."
Cancer in a Cold Climate: The Shafting of St Luke's Hospital will be officially launched tonight by Senator David Norris in the Irish Writers Centre at 7pm in Parnell Square, Dublin.
In a statement this afternoon, the HSE said the implementation of the National Cancer Control Programme would give Irish patients greater survival opportunities and provide them with a better quality of life after treatment.
It said investment in two new radiotherapy units at the designated cancer centres in Beaumont and St James's hospitals would see an increase of 50 per cent capacity in the eastern region.