Ms Eilísh Hardiman:

We can give the Senator a full report. The committee members have that. Sharing that information is no problem. With regard to how we deliver paediatric services, it is important to understand that the vast majority of the services we deliver are outpatient-based services and emergency and urgent care. The committee will note that in the planning for this hospital we have seen significant increases in provision for outpatients. We would have a total of 141 outpatient rooms.

They are spread between the outpatient centres in Connolly and Tallaght in addition to the new children's hospital. The vast majority of services can and should be delivered in paediatrics on the same day through outpatient facilities. Again, that reflects how we are moving, with Sláintecare, to much more nurse-led and health and social care professional-led clinics, not just consultant-based clinics.

We have considered the activity and planning and projected the future requirements and we have mapped them into the particular rooms. We can give the members a breakdown because the mapping is based on different specialties. Let me give an example. Some clinics usually involve once-off visits. Some 25% of the population are children and because we are dealing with all those with the tertiary needs and those who require the high-end specialties, many have multiple appointments. Sometimes they come to our hospitals and spend the whole day going between the various specialties. The cystic fibrosis children take up the whole day in one room because we do not mix them with others for infection-control reasons. Sometimes one child can take up a whole day in clinic. The breakdown accounts for this. The activity and planning analysis can map this.

It is important to note a children's hospital is different from an adult hospital and needs very many auxiliary supports. We have facilities for parents to stay in the hospital close to the critical care, or what we call "within dressing-gown distance". The mothers and fathers and other family members are with critically ill children and we need to support them. This is different from other cases.

It is important to note that the hospital is to be the only one educating future healthcare professionals in paediatrics. All the undergraduates in medicine and nursing and the health and social care professionals will be based there. The hospital includes the education centres to facilitate this. We have developed these with the universities. All seven universities will have some association with the hospital. That has to be taken into account.

One must consider the sheer volume of support required. In our planning, we have prioritised to ensure that all the clinical requirements are met. We have sought and optimised the support structure. That was one of the benefits of being co-located on a large medical campus, namely, the 50-acre campus at St. James's. We have managed to achieve some efficiencies in this regard through shared services. We are utilising services that are for the whole of the campus and not just for the children's hospital. We have actually built in capacity to take on the maternity hospital also. All these factors need to be taken into account.