The history of St. Mary's Orthopaedic Hospital on the north side of Cork shows that in its day it provided a vision of the future. The new buzz word in Cork in terms of health services is reconfiguration. Everything will be moved around. It is as if one were talking about pieces on a chessboard. It does not matter if it is right or wrong; services will be moved. It started with the breast clinic in the South Infirmary-Victoria University Hospital which was moved to the new campus in Cork University Hospital, CUH. We are all agreed that centres of excellence are the way of the future and the unit has proven to be very successful.
However, I am concerned about the proposed move of St. Mary's Orthopaedic Hospital in Gurranebraher. I am surprised that Professor John Higgins has recommended the move as I have great admiration for the work he does in his specialist field, namely, gynaecology and obstetrics. I do not understand the logic of taking an orthopaedic service from a 30 acre site which was specially designed for that purpose to put it into the South Infirmary-Victoria University Hospital. Plans were unveiled last year for the merger of that hospital with the Mercy University Hospital which involved the building of a new hospital to replace the two original hospitals because they were deemed not fit for purpose. It is planned to take the orthopaedic service from a 30 acre site to put it into a hospital that was not considered fit for purpose as a general hospital.
I am pleased the Minister of State, Deputy Connick, is present as he knows what I am talking about. Orthopaedics is the heavy lifting end of surgery yet it is planned to put it into a hospital that has no parking. If one goes to the hospital with a broken leg that will be the least of one's troubles. One will leave the hospital either in a wheelchair or on crutches but one's car will be parked half a mile down the road because there is no parking outside the hospital. The parking in the hospital is for staff only yet it is planned to incorporate an orthopaedic service into a hospital that has outdated lifts and no ground floor service. That is what is proposed although orthopaedic patients more than likely will not be able to walk on their own.
The orthopaedic hospital is on a 30 acre site. We were promised that a new rehabilitation service to serve the entire south of the country would be built there but that will not happen now. The Health Service Executive is in discussion with the local authority and other interested parties about turning the site into a commercial area. This move is more about making it convenient for doctors than providing a better service for patients which worries me very much.
When the North Infirmary closed 22 years ago the last general hospital on the north side of Cork was removed. If the orthopaedic hospital goes then that will be the last vestige of inpatient service available on the north side of Cork. When Professor John Higgins first spoke about reconfiguration — I have no doubt he is well intentioned — he told us that no hospital would close as a result of reconfiguration. I do not know what one would call a unit that does not have beds but it is not a hospital. He might talk about primary care and other issues but St. Mary's will not be a hospital and orthopaedics will not fit well into the campus where he intends to put it.
There is one aspect of health services in St. Mary's Orthopaedic Hospital that he should reconfigure, namely, Grove House, which houses people with severe intellectual disabilities. I am told by the HSE that no money is available for that move and that the service will remain on the site. It is a case of people being put in the most inappropriate place one could possibly imagine for their condition yet no move is proposed for them. This is about selling the site and getting money for HSE south. It is not about providing a better service. The people of Cork had every faith in the service, which had the only public orthopaedic outpatients' clinic in the country. That worked extraordinarily well but it is going to be moved because it is located on a valuable 30 acre site on the north side of Cork. A total of 220 jobs will be taken out of the area, one which desperately needs the type of investment which those jobs provided. However, that does not matter to the HSE. It should matter to the Minister of State how the service is provided and how areas will manage without it.
