Ms Eilísh Hardiman:

Particular futuristic treatments were mentioned. To be clear, the national cancer programme has led the way in planning proton therapy which only three to five children need. It is more for adults. We access such facilities in London. Something of that nature, a highly specialised treatment, would have to be developed with paediatric and adult services in mind. St. James's Hospital is the largest provider of cancer services in the State. It is also the provider of radiation oncology services. There will be future expansion of radiation oncology services for both paediatric and adult services.

I heard mention of a PET-CT scanner. No, we do not have a PET-CT scanner and will not in the children's hospital because such small numbers use it. We will access the one that is already in St. James's Hospital. Yes, we have developed a workforce plan. We engaged with the directors of nursing, the clinical directors, the health and social care professionals and the management of the three children's hospitals. The plan outlines our staffing requirements for the next five years to open up both the paediatric and outpatient urgent care centres at Connolly hospital and Tallaght hospital and the new children's hospital. We have also identified that the majority of the staffing increase is in the nursing area. In planning for that we have a workforce planner specifically for nursing looking at the supply of children’s health nursing over the next five years in a planned way, as opposed to getting to the point where we realise we need to train more such nurses. We have a systematic process identified of what our requirements are and a plan put in place over the next five years to look at how we can supply. There is a global shortage of some specialties but we are also looking at whether there are new and different roles that can be introduced to alleviate some of the pressures that have been well established in other jurisdictions in particular areas.

I am pleased that people picked up on the fact that it is really important that while the building is a catalyst, there is strong consensus across the staff of the three children’s hospitals. We have had more than 1,000 hours of engagement. Currently, we have 200 of our staff working in planning the rooms. We have 6,000 rooms that are being designed. They are attending meetings on planning. I reassure the committee that the staff within the three children’s hospitals are actively engaged in designing the hospital and, more important, they are actively engaged in how we are going to work together as a single legal entity by 2018, before we move into the new hospital. Before I came here my previous role was CEO of Tallaght hospital, which was a merger of three hospitals. It is really important that the building works because we are the hospital that will be providing services to the children of the greater Dublin area and all of the national services but it is really when people come to get treated by doctors, nurses and health care professionals that we will get the integration right. We have some great fundamentals driving that, because no other hospitals in the adult system or even in the maternity system, work in an integrated way as do the three children’s hospitals. Every day we have staff going between the three children’s hospitals. Every day we have patients and families going between the three hospitals so we work already in that manner.

I heard reference to a staff survey. I wish to clarify that is not an official survey. It was not endorsed by the management and leadership of Crumlin hospital. It was a SurveyMonkey survey that one puts up on a web page. I completed it myself ten times so I question the validity of the outcomes of the survey.

I was asked whether I personally believe that St. James’s Hospital is the right site. Absolutely, yes. I come very much from a personal position. I have spent 25 years in management. I am a nurse by background and I was a director of nursing in St. James’s Hospital for five years, the deputy CEO there for almost four years and the CEO of Tallaght hospital for three years. In all of those years of experience, I recall the time when a very sick mother with twins from the Coombe had to come to St. James’s Hospital to deliver them in our theatre because she needed critical post-operative access to ICU. That was the toughest day of my medical and management history, whereby we had to deal with a woman who was critically ill and almost at the stage of barely surviving and two very tiny babies. We had to organise incubators to come over from Crumlin hospital and all of the special requirements for the mother from the Coombe. I am pleased to say we worked on that but it took a significant amount of effort for all three of them to survive, and they did survive. Our vision for the future is driven by those experiences, whereby we will have a corridor length to travel if the mother is at high risk and needs to get into the adult ICU and when babies and neonates require neonatal intensive care. I am very much personally driven by that most harrowing experience of my career.

In terms of weaknesses in Connolly hospital, we work with the management and staff in that hospital because we are planning an urgent paediatric care and outpatient centre. We have very good relationships with the hospital in regard to that. People in the area are very pleased to have paediatrics on the site of that hospital. Families are already attending the emergency department there because of their adult requirements and they look forward to the day when they will be able to attend for all of their requirements, not just adult but paediatrics. We have had engagement with the GPs locally who see this as a good development, as opposed to going into the inner city to get those treatments. Having said that, if I was to outline some of the examples of where the benefits are between Connolly hospital and St. James’s Hospital, it has to lie-----