Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 21 September 2023
290. Deputy Verona Murphy asked the Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science what additional capacity within the further and higher education system he is planning to address the chronic shortage of healthcare professionals across all sectors of healthcare in Ireland; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [40795/23]
View answerMy Department and the Department of Health have made significant progress in providing additional places on healthcare programmes. This year, 460 additional places were created in healthcare programmes, including key therapeutic disciplines. This represents meaningful additionality within existing infrastructure in the Higher Education sector.
This follows on from the work of the working group my Department established last year to identify and address barriers to expansion in the health and social care professions. This working group has included representatives from the Department of Health, the HSE, CORU, and the higher education sector. This group looked at both incremental expansion from September 2023, and enabling more substantial expansion in the medium term.
The HEA recently conducted an expression of interest process for Higher Education Institutions interested in building capacity in Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, Dentistry and Veterinary Medicine. Significant options for expansion were identified, and these options are being considered in the context of the Estimates process and National Development Plan capital ceilings. A further process will consider options to build capacity in priority therapy disciplines.
Following engagement between Queens University and Ulster University, my Department and the Departments of Health, both North and South, 200 places in nursing are available to students from this jurisdiction from this September. A further fifty places are available in therapy disciplines in Ulster University from September 2023, with 20 places each in occupational therapy and physiotherapy, and 10 places in speech and language therapy.
There are also a number of healthcare-related courses provided in the further education sector in the areas of occupational therapy assistant, physiotherapy assistant, psychology and dietetics. I recently announced the roll-out of PLC courses to train speech and language therapist assistants. These PLC courses will be running in five Education and Training Boards from this month, with an estimated 120 students expected on these programmes.
