Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)

I thank Deputy McGrath for raising this important issue. I take this Adjournment matter on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney. We welcome the opportunity to set out the position on cancer services at Beaumont Hospital, one of the eight cancer centres designated by the HSE last month.

The implementation of the national cancer control strategy is a major priority for the Government. The overarching objective of the strategy is to deliver high quality, fully integrated, multi-modality cancer care nationally. The delivery of cancer services on a programmatic basis will serve to ensure equity of access to services and equality of patient outcome, irrespective of geography. The decision of the HSE to provide four managed cancer control networks and eight cancer centres will be implemented on a managed and phased basis. The HSE plans to have completed 80-90% of the transition of services to the cancer centres by the end of 2009 and has informed the Department that meetings and discussions are under way with the eight centres.

Beaumont Hospital has also been selected as a site for the development of radiation oncology facilities. Initially, four linear accelerators will be provided at the hospital. This will be increased to an equivalent capacity of eight linear accelerators on an incremental basis thereafter. The contract for the design consultants for the new facilities at the hospital has commenced. The evaluation process for procurement of the supply contract is also under way and a technical subgroup is preparing the equipping specification for the phase one developments.

The HSE has confirmed that it will have in place radiation oncology capacity to meet population need by 2010, after which it will continue to increase capacity to ensure these needs continue to be met. The Minister is fully confident that this will be achieved through a combination of direct Exchequer provision, public private partnerships and, where appropriate in the interim, the use of capacity in the private sector.

The HSE reports that Beaumont Hospital treats significant numbers of cancer patients, with nearly 7,000 day cases and more than 800 inpatients treated in 2006. From January to June this year, more than 3,500 day cases and 450 inpatients were treated at the hospital. The HSE has informed the Department that revenue funding of more than €10 million has been provided for this purpose in 2007, including non-pay costs of more than €6 million.

The Minister recently approved national quality assurance standards for symptomatic breast disease services under the Health Act 2007. The specialist centre for symptomatic breast disease services at Beaumont Hospital was officially opened last year. The HSE has informed the Department that additional revenue funding of almost €1.7 million has been provided for this service. Seven new consultant appointments have been made to facilitate the development across the various modalities of care, including surgery, radiology and medical oncology, with further appointments due to be made in breast surgery, plastic surgery and pathology. There have also been appointments in nursing, physiotherapy and counselling. The unit operates a fully multidisciplinary symptomatic breast disease service with multidisciplinary meetings and triple assessment clinics. Last year, 235 new breast cancers were recorded at Beaumont Hospital and more than 1,600 women attended for mammography services.

As I have outlined to the House, there have been significant developments in cancer services at Beaumont Hospital. The Government will continue to build on developments to date in cancer services nationally, including at Beaumont Hospital.

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