Mary Harney (Dublin Mid West, Progressive Democrats)

On 31 October last, the HSE announced the details of the high level framework brief for the new national paediatric hospital. The brief was prepared by Rawlinson Kelly & Whittlestone Limited, RKW, an established UK-based health care planning company. The content of the report was informed by the views of a range of international experts, including architectural and clinical experts.

The brief sets out the range of services to be delivered at the new hospital and the additional services to be provided outside of the main hospital through an ambulatory-urgent care service. The brief will help to inform the work of the national paediatric hospital development board in planning, designing, building, furnishing and equipping the new hospital.

The new hospital will be at the centre of a national paediatric network, linked to regional and local hospitals and to primary and community care services through outreach, telemedicine, joint appointments and staff rotation. The new hospital will be supported by an ambulatory and urgent care service. The first such centre will be developed at Tallaght.

The vast majority of children attending the National Children's Hospital emergency department do not require admission and will continue to access their care locally at the new ambulatory and urgent care centre. RKW estimated in the report that the first centre at Tallaght will have the capacity to cater for up to 48,000 emergency attendances and up to 58,000 outpatient appointments, based on demographic and activity projections up to 2021. A significant level of day case surgery will also be carried out at the new centre. There will be 20 day case beds and three theatres with capacity for up to 9,000 day case procedures. Clearly, this projected level of activity would be subject to change depending on the number and location of any additional ambulatory emergency units. The high level framework brief has been provided to the national paediatric hospital development board. The HSE will be meeting with the board to agree on the operational arrangements for bringing the project forward to the next stage.

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