Dr. Colm Henry:

There has been a large volume of calls over the weekend and the serious incident management team became aware of it very quickly. In addition to the 15 trained nurses in place this morning, we have provided an additional 40 to 50 public health nurse staff, between doctors and nurses, who are being made available today to answer messages that have been left and those who have requested callbacks. They are being provided with brief training and information to provide to patients or concerned members of the public the most accurate information, and encourage them to continue to partake in the screening programme. These calls may take some time, perhaps 25 minutes apiece, so at the same time we need to get the message out there, and today on the websites of CervicalCheck and the HSE we have provided information for the public, including a video message by Dr. McKenna of the national women and infants health programme, who is with us today. In addition, today we have engaged with primary care and we have sent information on frequently asked questions and frequent scenarios to all general practitioners, circulated through the Irish College of General Practitioners, the Irish Medical Organisation and the National Association of General Practitioners. In addition, we have printed and sent this to all smear takers in our service. This information explains the background to the service and provides a framework of advice to GPs to provide to any concerned patients.