A protest is due to take place at Monaghan General Hospital this week in memory of those who died or suffered trauma as a result of services having been withdrawn from the hospital.
Wednesday's protest comes after a man in his 50s, who collapsed with a suspected heart attack in Monaghan town last week, died in an ambulance on his way to Cavan General Hospital. The ambulance could not take him to his local hospital a short distance away because it is off call for emergencies.
Mr Peadar McMahon, chairman of the Monaghan Hospital Community Alliance, said the man who died last Monday en route to Cavan might "have had the chance to live" if taken to Monaghan Hospital and treated immediately. The hospital has been off call since mid-2002 and Mr McMahon said there were queries over the deaths of at least 13 people, who during the last 18 months had to travel distances to receive hospital care as a result of the service being withdrawn.
He accused the health board of "dragging its feet" about putting the hospital back on call.
The North Eastern Health Board, which runs the hospital, said the hospital would be put back on call in January. It added that the ambulance and its staff responded to the latest case "in the appropriate way".
This latest man's death follows a similar incident in October when Mr Benny McCullagh (72) died in an ambulance on his way to Cavan General Hospital, after a heart attack in his home just 300 metres from Monaghan Hospital.
Local GP Dr Illona Duffy claimed at the time if Mr McCullagh had been brought to his local hospital he would have been given life-saving clot-busting drugs that would have given him "a fighting chance". Ambulance staff can't administer those drugs.
She said yesterday she was aware of two other cases of Monaghan men in their 40s dying of heart attacks on the way to or shortly after arriving at Cavan Hospital.
Dr John Barton, a consultant cardiologist at Portiuncula Hospital, Ballinasloe, has claimed their chances of survival "may have been significantly higher", if treated immediately in Monaghan and stabilised rather than having to travel 37 miles to Cavan.
Mr McMahon said the protest outside Monaghan Hospital would also be an opportunity to show support for staff, who have seen several services, including maternity services, withdrawn in recent years.