I thank the Deputy for raising the matter. A number of different things are happening. As the Deputy is aware, Limerick has already been the beneficiary of additional bed capacity and staffing. Another 96-bed unit will be completed shortly. There is also a surgical hub. The Deputy mentioned scheduled procedures being cancelled. Those procedures will be scheduled in the surgical hub and that will be followed by an elective hospital. Limerick is the beneficiary of considerable investment in beds and staff. There are still problems, however, and I thank the Deputy for highlighting them. He is quite right to do so. As he is aware, I have this week placed a particular focus on the deployment of all of the contracts in all of the hospitals to ensure we are getting the best outcomes for patient safety and to ensure that all hospitals are consistently using all the levers available to them to avoid the consistent problems that Limerick has.
Sentiment score: 0.17
The Taoiseach and I might go together. It is an excellent hospital that needs more investment. I am happy to speak to the Deputy about the capital plan for the coming year. I will be opening a new lung care research facility in the hospital shortly and I ask the Deputy to come along. It is an excellent hospital that is deserving of continued investment.
Sentiment score: 0.44
I thank the Deputy. I am more than happy to sit down with him about the provision for Kerry more generally in the capital plan. He is right to highlight the trolley situation. At 8 a.m. on Saturday, 1 February, for example, there were only four people on trolleys in University Hospital Kerry. By Tuesday morning, that number had risen to 18. There were 24 the following day and 28 thereafter. The number then fell to two the following Saturday. It moved to six before going back up to 20 on Monday and Tuesday, following the weekend. I am happy to speak to the Deputy about the underlying issues in respect of capacity but there is a weekend issue in University Hospital Kerry, as much as there is in other hospitals, and we must get to the bottom of that. It is not acceptable that the Deputy's constituents are more likely to wait on a trolley on a Sunday or Monday than on a Wednesday. That is not okay.
Sentiment score: 0.14
I am aware of the issue and am beginning to examine that. It is a pan-European problem so perhaps I can come back to the Deputy on it. I am very aware of it. On the cost of HRT, provision was made in the budget for HRT products but not for the dispensing fee. That is covered in parliamentary questions going back to October and November last year and that position has not changed. The Government set aside money to pay for the products but not the dispensing fee for pharmacists. I have met the pharmaceutical union. I am engaging with it to see if there is something we can do but the reality is we do not have the budget to carry the dispensing fees. Patients are being charged €48 or €62 or whatever the fee is, but you do not see the breakdown of the cost. If a woman is getting two HRT products, for example, she is paying two dispensing fees, which might be €7, €8, €9 or €10 per product. We intend to cover the cost of the medication. If we were to extend the budgetary allowance for that, I would have to take that from somewhere else and that would mean we would not be able to do something else. I am trying to find a resolution. I ask the Deputy to please allow me a couple of weeks to do that. I hope the pharmaceutical union will come back with something we can work on.
Sentiment score: 0.05