Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will go through the various questions and the Deputy is free to tell me to stop whenever he wants. The overall question is linked to the community healthcare question of whether Sláintecare is for real. For me, Sláintecare is a roadmap to universal healthcare and having high-quality care when people need it. I am taking this matter deadly seriously and I hope the Deputy can see that from the €600 million winter plan and the budget for next year, which is the biggest additional healthcare budget in recent times, possibly ever. It has the single biggest target ever for acute beds, critical care beds, hospital doctors, hospital nurses, community beds, step-down beds, rehabilitation beds and community clinicians, which is daunting because this is a massive task.

As the Deputy will see when he looks at the budget, we have very deliberately broken it up into big chunks one of which relates to community care. We are looking at a level of investment in community care for next year that is unprecedented for all of the reasons he outlined. This is in today's Revised Estimate because it included €200 million of the €600 million winter plan. If one considers the whole approach to the winter plan, it is exactly that. It is home care hours, GP access to diagnostics, public health nursing and home intervention teams. Let me give a brilliant example. There is a pilot scheme, called frailty teams, at St. Columcille's Hospital, Loughlinstown, County Dublin. Teams of an advanced paramedic, advanced nurse practitioners, occupational therapists and, sometimes, consultant doctors are sent to the houses of people who normally would be brought to the emergency department of St. Vincent's Hospital. The teams stabilise people in their homes. The cars that accompany the teams contain some advanced diagnostic equipment. The teams can conduct a teleconference with the emergency departments and specialists at St. Vincent's and in St. Columcille's. The pilot scheme has led to a 90% reduction in the number of people having to go to hospital. I am seeking the €200 million in funding to which I refer in order do these amazing things.

The next issue is cataracts. I acknowledge that the Deputy has raised the issue before and is absolutely spot on. My understanding of the issue that he has again raised with me is as follows. The problem with the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, is that one can only access it if one has been examined by a consultant.