Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 27 July 2021
2635. Deputy Fergus O'Dowd asked the Minister for Health the measures which have been undertaken to empower the Chief Inspector of HIQA to be in a position to take urgent and appropriate action in circumstances in which the safety and privacy of nursing home residents are reported as high risk; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [38567/21]
View answerThe Chief Inspector of Social Services in the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, is the statutory independent regulator in place for the nursing home sector, whether a HSE managed or a private nursing home. The Chief Inspector, established under the Health Act 2007, has significant and wide-ranging powers up to and including withdrawing the registration of a nursing home facility, which means that it can no longer operate as a service provider. This responsibility is underpinned by a comprehensive quality framework comprising of Registration Regulations, Care and Welfare Regulations and National Quality Standards for older people and national standards for infection prevention and control.
The Chief Inspector, in discharging her duties determines, through examination of all information available to her, including site inspections, whether a nursing homes meets the regulations in order to achieve and maintain its registration status. Should a nursing home be deemed to be non-compliant with the Regulations and the National Quality Standards, it may either fail to achieve or lose its registration status. In addition, the Chief Inspector has wide discretion in deciding whether to impose conditions of registration on nursing homes. I understand that the Chief Inspector takes a risk based approach to regulation, prioritising regulatory activities and resources for monitoring, inspection and enforcement, based on the assessment of the risk that the regulated services pose.
It is also important to recognise that learning from the early stages of the pandemic has been integral to the Government’s responses as the pandemic has progressed. The COVID-19 Nursing Homes Expert Panel considered lessons learned from the initial wave of the pandemic in developing recommendations that focus on immediate, short-term actions required for the response to COVID-19 as well as on long-term actions required to effect the strategic reform of nursing home systems, operation, policy, and legislation.
In addition, having regard to the NHEP recommendations, learning from the pandemic and HIQA's suggested regulatory enhancements, the Minister for Health and I approved a two-phased approach to examining the legislation with a view to proposing interim enhancements to the primary and secondary legislation governing nursing homes in phase 1, with a primary focus on enforcement, governance, oversight and certain regulatory areas including infection prevention and control. It is expected that, subject to Government approval draft Heads of Bill will be published by the end of the year.
I expect phase 2, which will be a comprehensive review of the regulatory framework to formally commence in the second half of 2022. In the meantime, the Minister for Health and I have commissioned an international evidence review of nursing home regulatory models which will assist and provide evidence to inform the planned comprehensive review.
