Time taken to develop new hospital in Glanmire is criticised by TD

PLANS to develop a new elective hospital for Cork look to be progressing, however, the time it is taking to deliver the project has been criticised.

Tenders are due to go out this month for an architect-led design team for the new elective hospital, due to be located at the Sarsfield’s Court site in Glanmire.

The information was provided by the HSE to Cork North Central Sinn Féin TD, Thomas Gould, in response to a Dáil question enquiring about the current stage of the development of the proposed elective hospital in Cork.

In the letter to the TD, Ellen McLoughlin, the General Manager of Acute Operations, said the successful architect-led design team would be in place by summer and added that the ‘complementary project control team will also be co-ordinated around this timeframe’.

“Since the approval in December 2022 of the Elective Hospitals Business Case, the HSE has been progressing the Elective Hospitals Programme,” said Ms O’Loughlin in the HSE letter.

“This includes work to further define the shape and scale of the hospitals and how they will operate and the initiation of procurement, ICT and workforce planning.”

According to the Sinn Féin TD, however, the design team for the project should have been appointed by the end of January.

“In December 2022, the Sarsfield Hospital Site in Glanmire was announced,” said Mr Gould. “This was the latest in a long line of announcements about a new hospital for Cork. Yet, it is now 2024 and it doesn’t appear that the HSE has moved one step closer to opening this hospital since that date.

“At the time, a commitment was given that the next phase of the Business Case would be approved by the end of 2023.

“Instead, it is April and the response I received from the HSE doesn’t even present a timeline.”

Mr Gould called for the process to be sped up.

“We have a hospital in this city that regularly sees the second highest number of people on trolleys and important medical appointments are cancelled across all hospitals weekly,” he said.

“This is because there isn’t enough capacity. It is long past time that the Government stopped shrugging their shoulders on healthcare and started taking action.”

In her letter, Ms. McLoughlin said the HSE was ‘also addressing waiting lists in the shorter term by expanding the development of surgical hubs at locations across the country including Cork’.