St Luke's to be retained as health facility

St Luke’s Hospital in Rathgar, Dublin will be retained as a public health facility after its cancer services are closed in 2014, the Minister for Health has said.

Mary Harney was speaking to the Dáil Committee on Health about a bill which will see the radiation oncology services at St Luke’s transferred to St James’s Hospital and Beaumont Hospital.

An amendment proposing the hospital could only be used for medical purposes related to cancer treatment and that it could not be sold was put forward by Labour health spokeswoman Jan O’Sullivan

The change to the Health (Miscellaneous) Bill 2010 would help to maintain the hospital’s “unique atmosphere” about which so many people testify, Ms O’Sullivan said.

However, Ms Harney said that did not want to place such a prescriptive proposal in the legislation before she saw proposals from the board of St Luke’s.

The site would be retained for public health services which might be a combination of palliative care (including non-cancer care) and long-term care, she said. She did not want to pre-empt the forthcoming suggestions from the board.

Ms O’Sullivan’s amendment was defeated by a majority of the committee. Despite the verbal promise by Ms Harney there was a “need to pin down that it would be used for public health”, Ms O’Sullivan said.

There was a genuine fear that the site would be sold off and a verbal commitment was not enough, she said.

The ethos of St Luke’s would be kept and the hospital would not be sold, Ms Harney said. Land near the city centre for public health use was hard to get and there would be a growing demand for health services so St Luke’s would be used, she added.

While Ms Harney had maintained a commitment to keep the ethos of St Luke’s, she had “never been clear” about what exactly that will mean, Fine Gael TD for Dublin South East Lucinda Creighton said.

There was a recurring theme in the Health Service Executive of taking away services today on the promise of nirvana which tomorrow which does not come, Fine Gael health spokesman Dr James Reilly said.

Fine Gael is to propose an amendment to the bill at report stage which would mean that there could be no change of the hospital’s use in future without reverting to the Dáil Health Committee, he said.