Vol. 469 No. 2
12 Mr. Clohessy asked the Minister for Health the hospitals which has been contacted to carry out 500 additional cardiac surgery operations in 1996; the cost of the additional procedures; the number of public patients who will be left on the waiting list following the additional operations; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [16986/96]
Limerick East): The strategy to deal with cardiac surgery waiting lists has been to provide additional facilities and infrastructure within the public hospital service to increase annual activity.
To date this strategy has resulted in: an additional cardiac surgeon being appointed at the Mater Hospital where the annual activity for open heart operations has been increased by 250 per year to 1,000 per year; an additional cardiac surgeon being appointed to Cork University Hospital to increase the output from 200 to 400 open heart operations per year.
The combined effect of this action will be to increase annual activity for cardiac surgery in the public hospital service to 1,400 per year, an increase of 47 per cent.
I am anxious to further expand the public hospital capacity for cardiac surgery. I am fully committed to the provision of additional capacity including the appointment of additional cardiac surgeons on a permanent basis within the public hospital system over the next two to three years. However, because of the need to ensure that future developments are well planned and to allow sufficient time to put in place the type of permanent, expensive, high-cost infrastructure required for cardiac surgery it will take some time before this additional capacity comes on stream. In the interim my Department is engaged in the purchase of cardiology and cardiac surgery procedures from health care organisations at prices which are reasonable and affordable.
