Niamh Smyth
Ceist:232. Deputy Niamh Smyth asked the Minister for Health the estimated full-year cost to expand publicly-funded regional fertility hubs for each province. [25135/22]
Amharc ar fhreagraWednesday, 18 May 2022
Ceisteanna (232)
Freagraí scríofa
My Department is working with the HSE’s National Women & Infants Health Programme to implement a Model of Care for Infertility to ensure that infertility issues are addressed through the public health system at the lowest level of clinical intervention necessary.
This model of care comprises three stages, starting in primary care (i.e., GPs), extending into secondary care (i.e., Regional Fertility Hubs) and then, where necessary, tertiary care (i.e., IVF and other advanced assisted human reproduction (AHR) treatments), with patients being referred onwards through structured pathways.
Phase One of the roll-out of the Model of Care for Infertility has involved the establishment of Regional Fertility Hubs one within each of the six maternity networks across the country. These Hubs aim to maximise the outcome for women and their partners by offering an assessment and management service on-site that will streamline the process and minimise delays in access to fertility services.
These Hubs offer a tailored, multi-disciplinary approach. Patients are referred, if they meet the relevant criteria, by their GPs to their local Hub, which is being resourced so that it has available specific expertise in this area from a medical perspective, a nursing perspective and a laboratory perspective.
Following the provision of funding in 2020 and again in 2021, six Regional Fertility Hubs have been established and are now operational in the National Maternity Hospital, the Rotunda, the Coombe, Cork University Maternity Hospital, University Hospital Galway and at Nenagh General Hospital (under the governance of University Maternity Hospital Limerick).
Question No. 233 answered with Question No. 231.