Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 29 May 2024
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Health
Challenges Facing Community-based Cancer Support Services: Discussion
Ms Gemma Fort:
It would be a mix. We have a mixture of nurses. Speaking for my own centre, we have two nurses and a counsellor who are our clinical team. We then bring in counsellors and play therapists to provide psychosocial services, and we bring in complementary therapists to provide that type of support. We are lucky in Kerry. We have eight complementary therapists who volunteer their time, but I know other centres have to pay complementary therapists. We are bringing in counsellors and complementary therapists to some centres. We are paying for counselling. Complementary therapists have to be paid. Obviously our core staff would be our clinical staff. We need administrative staff as well because there is a huge volume of administration and processing of numbers and figures. It is straddling client services and administration as well as therapeutic services. I might ask Mr. Flaherty, Mr. Conroy or Mr. O’Leary to come in.
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