Mr. Nicholas Jermyn:

On behalf of St. Vincent's University Hospital, I would like to reiterate our commitment to the statement to which we signed up with our colleagues in the HSE and the Cystic Fibrosis Association. It is important to say that the State has invested €7.7 million in the construction of the cystic fibrosis unit, the operational cost of which is €7 million per annum.

I would like to comment on recent statements in the public arena. On 23 November 2012, which was the Friday prior to the Monday and Tuesday on which the publicity occurred, there was a major outbreak of winter vomiting bug in many wards at the hospital, resulting in the closure of many areas to new admissions. Having said that, there were no patients awaiting admission on Saturday, 24 November. On Monday, all cystic fibrosis patients requiring hospital care were being cared for in the hospital. It is important to state that on the Monday there were 29 CF patients in the hospital, 24 of whom were located in the new Nutley wing. Other patients were located in other medical facilities because we could not put patients at risk of infection together. There are a group of patients who have CF who cannot be located with other patients, including on the same ward.

At 4 p.m. on Monday, 29 November, following clinic, an additional number of patients required admission. Of those six patients, three were offered beds in single rooms but not in the Nutley wing. One of the patients could not remain on that day and was taken in the following day. This was against the backdrop of the hospital and the accident and emergency department being full. On the Tuesday night, we admitted all those patients who had not been admitted on Monday night. On Tuesday at around 6 p.m. the medical team was informed that we were in difficulty with beds. Following a further clinic, an additional four patients required admission. We managed to find a bed for one of those patients. It was then decided to send the remaining patients home and to have them admitted the following day because we did not have the facilities required. At that stage, we had 29 CF inpatients. By 12.30 a.m. on the Wednesday, all patients requiring admission had been admitted. We flexed up our beds from 20 to 33. As I said, not all patients were accommodated in single en-suite rooms in the Nutley wing, but of the 33 admitted, 24 were in the Nutley wing and nine were placed in other units around the hospital. While most were in single en-suite rooms, one patient was in a single room which did not have a bathroom attached.

As we speak, there are 28 CF patients in the hospital. I am pleased to say that all but one of those patients are in the Nutley wing. The person not in the Nutley wing is located elsewhere due to infection risk, and it is hoped to have that patient accommodated in the Nutley wing by close of business today. I take this opportunity to thank Professor Gallagher and the consultants and nursing staff, who are working extremely hard. We have 45 other key specialties in the hospital. It is important we get our cystic fibrosis services right because we are the hub for the region and the country. I do not propose to say any more on that issue. I hope I have explained the situation.

We are in dialogue with the Cystic Fibrosis Association and work in partnership with it. A liaison committee meeting is due to be held tomorrow. We are considering the escalation policy in the hospital specific to cystic fibrosis and our criteria for admission and discharge. We need to communicate more effectively with the patients who do not get care as urgently as they would like. I want to reassure our population of patients that if they are critical they will be admitted. A patient who arrived at the hospital the other day in a critical state was taken care of. It is important that patients come to the hospital, as they do for all of the other specialties. I do not deny that we are challenged at times. The statement commits to our flexing our beds from ten to 34. We have not yet hit the target of 34 but we did, as I said earlier, reach 33. We have a day centre with ten individual rooms. If we cannot get a patient admitted during a particular day we will commence treatment in the day facility and will in an appropriate amount of time have him or her admitted. We admitted all patients within 24 hours and as such did flex up. However, it was not immediate and we are looking at how we can improve on that in the future.