asked the Minister for Health, in view of the National Economic and Social Council finding that acute hospital bed provision in Ireland is 50 per cent higher than in England and Wales, if his Department have reviewed their plans for hospital provision.
Ceisteanna — Questions. Oral Answers. - Acute Hospital Bed Provision.
10.
I presume the Deputy is referring to the National Economic and Social Council Report No. 73. entitled Health Services: The Implications of Demographic Change which contains international comparisons of acute hospital bed provision.
Table 4.2 of that report gives the number of acute hospital beds available per 1,000 population for a number of areas as follows:
|
England |
2.8 |
|
Wales |
3.1 |
|
Scotland |
3.5 |
|
Ireland |
3.8 |
|
Northern Ireland |
4.2 |
Figures such as these have appeared in a number of publications and are of course, well known in the Department of Health. There is a problem of definition with these figures and it is probable that like is not always being compared with like. However, the broad thrust of the figures which show England and Wales with the lowest ratio of beds and the ratio for this country between those for Scotland and Northern Ireland is generally accepted as being true.
However, when viewed in a European context the number of beds in Ireland is quite low with only the UK and the Netherlands having a lower number of beds per head of population.
As indicated in the national plan. Building on Reality, it is an important objective of health policy to shift resources away from institutional services into community services and, in line with this policy, the scale of a number of acute hospital developments included in the plan has been reduced.
The whole question of hospital bed provision is, of course, kept under constant review in my Department.
Is the Minister aware of and very concerned about the number of patients at present in the most expensive public hospital beds for whom an acute hospital is not the proper location, in other words, very old people who perhaps have suffered strokes and should be in long term care? Has the Minister any plans to ensure that suitable accommodation will be found for these people?
Yes, I am very concerned about this whole matter. I make the point that 40 per cent of all admissions to our acute hospitals are of persons over the age of 65 years. It would be very necessary to construct and expand a number of hospitals where acute residential nursing care would be required and persons transferred out of the acute hospitals as rapidly as possible. I know of acute hospitals with elderly patients who have been in there since, say, last November. They do not require further medical and surgical treatment and should be moved to other residential care which would be far more reasonable to run. On average, costs in an acute hospital are from £800 to £1,000 a week and the necessary care could be given at from £200 a week to £400 a week. Ironically, we could almost take over a few Dublin hotels and put these patients into places like the Shelbourne Hotel at half the cost.