Jimmy Devins (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fianna Fail)

I am taking this Adjournment matter on behalf of my colleague, the Minister for Health and Children.

I share the Deputy's concerns about MRSA and health care infections generally. I reiterate my commitment to ensuring that high-quality care is made available to all patients and to the further development of our health services, in particular the issue of patient safety.

Tackling health care associated infections, HCAI, including MRSA, is a priority for the Government and for the Health Service Executive. The HSE has established a national infection control action plan. It has put in place an infection control steering group, chaired by Dr. Pat Doorley, the national director of population health, to oversee the implementation of the plan. Over the next three to five years the HSE aims to reduce HCAIs by 20%, MRSA infections by 30% and antibiotic consumption by 20%. These targets will be achieved through the development of national and local level action plans to reduce the potential for spread of infections in health care settings. The steering group is supported by eight local implementation teams which will ensure that all local facilities are focused on achieving the national targets.

The availability of isolation facilities is an important factor in the overall solution to this issue. In that context, the Minister has already agreed with the HSE that designated private beds should be used where isolation facilities are required for patients who contract MRSA and this policy has been adopted by the HSE. New environmental building guidelines are being prepared by the HSE to inform infection control policy in all new builds and refurbishments.

The infrastructure of our current stock of hospitals is an issue but it is impossible to simply take an existing building like Beaumont Hospital and convert it into single rooms. There will be, however, an additional 28 single rooms in a new building planned for Beaumont Hospital that will address this issue which is due for completion next year. There will also be another four rooms in the new high dependency unit and two in the new intensive care unit.

The report the Deputy refers to relates to 2006 and many positive things have happened since then in the whole area of hygiene and infection control. Beaumont Hospital participated in the national acute hospitals hygiene audit in 2005 and again in 2006. The hospital's score of 83% in the 2006 audit was a considerable improvement on the 62% recorded in the first audit and just two points off the "good" category. This improvement was the result of enormous commitment and effort by staff throughout the hospital. In yesterday's hygiene assessment report by the Health Information and Quality Authority, Beaumont Hospital emerged as one of seven hospitals with a "good" rating.

That is a significant improvement, probably the biggest we have seen for any hospital. It shows that the approach of using audits to focus attention where it needs to be clearly works. I commend Beaumont Hospital on that achievement.

Beaumont has also introduced a new electronic alert mechanism on its computer system to notify staff of patients with MRSA on readmission. This has also been incorporated into the emergency department and hospital information systems. It allows bed managers to isolate potentially infective patients more effectively and earlier, where this is possible.

Not all HCAIs are preventable but significant steps are being taken to reduce the rates of infection and to treat them promptly when they occur. While there is much more work to be done, I note the improvements to date that Beaumont has achieved and expect this trend to continue in the best interests of patient care.

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