Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 7 July 2020
778. Deputy Maurice Quinlivan asked the Minister for Health the resources that have been assigned to build the capacity required to tackle the outpatient waiting lists for routine diagnostics, for example, cardiology and radiological scans. [14198/20]
View answerThe HSE advises that a pilot project commenced in 2016 by the HSE Acute Hospitals Division to progress the collection of national radiology waiting list data. The project has been supported by the Radiology Clinical Care Programme and has involved key stakeholders across the system including the National Integrated Medical Imaging System (NIMIS) Team, Hospital Groups, and the support of the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) for data collection and data management expertise.
At present, the pilot project collects data relating to CT, MRI and Ultrasound. In Q1 2020, there were a total of 190,373 patients reported on the waiting list from all sites, this represents all outpatients waiting, urgent, semi urgent, routine and planned/surveillance (where diagnostic access is planned at particular time intervals).
In terms of medium-term planning for additional diagnostic capacity, the National Development Plan states that, new dedicated ambulatory elective only hospital facilities will be introduced in Dublin, Galway and Cork. As per the Development plan, these facilities will provide high volume, low complexity procedures on a day and outpatient basis, together with a range of ambulatory diagnostic services.
As part of the wider Sláintecare implementation, the Elective Hospitals Oversight Group, established by the Department of Health, is currently developing a high-level facilities spatial brief and order of magnitude costs which details the elective clustering of appropriate activities for each of the three facilities in Dublin, Cork and Galway. This will also include an output and facility specification, based on efficient and effective service delivery, which will include diagnostic procedures. This is due to be completed in the Autumn of 2020.
