Mary O'Rourke (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)

I welcome to the opportunity to speak on the Health (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill which provides for the dissolution of the board of St. Luke's Hospital and the transfer of its staff to the HSE. As other Members have done, I wish to praise St. Luke's Hospital for what it has achieved for patients through the years. People diagnosed with cancer went to St. Luke's for treatment with a heavy heart. That was until they entered into the hospital which was a kind environment, if one can call a cancer treatment centre such. The staff were interested in patients' well-being and recovery. An air of welcome, courtesy and hospitality was evident in St. Luke's. Anyone who went there as a patient or visitor would know they were entering a house of well-being.

Now the hospital will enter into the centres of excellence treatment programme as laid out by the Minister for Health and Children, Deputy Harney, and Professors Tom Keane and Brendan Drumm. I hope these intangible qualities of welcome, courtesy and hospitality and the well-being evident to all who entered the portals of St.Luke's will be enabled in a real way after this transfer to the HSE. I hope the board and the staff will bring with them this aura which is necessary to a patient's well-being during cancer treatment.

Even in this day and age with all the advances in cancer treatment, when a person is diagnosed with it, it still causes immense dread. All these advances are set at nought for the patient, his or her immediate and wider family and circle of friends. It is amazing this primitive feeling of dread is still strong.

I also want to commend the work done by the Friends of St. Luke's Hospital. For many years I had dealings with the group, participating in some of its fundraising events. I know the energy and dedication of those who worked on behalf of the organisation. I salute them for raising up to €26 million over the years, which was put into hospital facilities, research and ongoing treatment including radiation and oncology. They are a great bunch of people and I understand from the Minister's speech and from speaking to some other Members that they intend to continue this fine activity which they have undertaken and to which they wish to continue. They are imbued too. Earlier, I referred to the staff and the aura within St. Luke's but each of the Friends of St. Luke's are imbued with those same qualities. "The quality of mercy is not strain'd, it droppeth as the gentle rain from Heaven upon the place beneath". This sentiment is the way they treated their job or vocation.

We are discussing the transference of all of this to the HSE but I hope those fine qualities are not smothered by the HSE and that during this transference those qualities are not lost, smothered or sent off on another route, which can happen in large organisations. Deputy Durkan was right when he maintains that small is beautiful. I am a firm advocate of the centres of excellence for cancer care. When she embarked on the road of setting up centres of excellence, the Minister embarked on a very tortuous Via Dolorosa along which many people attempted to throw stones at the idea and objective.

There is no doubt that if one wishes to have excellence in cancer care the experience gained by many prognoses and treatments stands to the test when a person presents for treatment. If the doctor, clinician and all such people in charge do not have a vast array of experiences within their grasp, which they can use for the curative good of the patient who presents himself or herself, then the care will not be as thorough or far-seeing as it would be within a centre of excellence of cancer care.

I refer to what should take place now. The idea of centres of excellence should be extended to other areas of ill-health in our population. I speak particularly of the Alzheimer agenda. The work of the Minister of State, Deputy Moloney, touches upon this as well. There is a case to be made now for the road of the Alzheimer agenda to be travelled and to have centres where the finest research can be undertaken. It is evident that where centres of excellence exist, research can be channelled and, if it is not already undertaken in these centres, it can be channelled to work for the good of the body of patients who go there.

There is no doubt that in the modern world Alzheimer's is a complaint widespread and terrifying in its implications. In a way it is as terrifying, not so much for the patients, but for those who mind them, as cancer was in its horrific impact on people. I commend Deputy Michael Noonan who, on "The Frontline" programme, spoke so feelingly and from the heart of the journey he travelled with his dear wife towards Alzheimer's and towards the oblivion towards which people who suffer from Alzheimer's travel. He spoke so feelingly that he unlocked a well of feeling and support towards that complaint and towards anything that could be done to address it.

I am keen to see progress made with cancer care such as that spearheaded by Professor Tom Keane and the Minister, Deputy Mary Harney and well done to them. It was a very difficult task. Naturally, the places where cancer care had been well given and received would wish to hold on to that, a natural wish and feeling. However, from the outset I was in favour of the centres of excellence because I took the view that if I were ill I would rather go where I could be assured of top quality exploration and curative care and I could be there for the receipt of ongoing research.

In that vein, we should take the same path for the Alzheimer's agenda. It is pervasive and I do not know what we used to call it long ago. I am aware of the man who gave his name to the condition, which is well documented but the prevalence of it now is amazing. There is strong ongoing research into the Alzheimer debate and it has yielded some very positive results. One cannot lift up a newspaper at the weekend but to find a snippet about new research into Alzheimer's and how it could, hopefully, have an effect in time on the work of those who work for and with people with the complaint and as they travel onwards in life.

I commend Deputy Michael Noonan who opened his heart to us all in that television interview. He gave a personal and acute insight into what it has meant to him and to many other people throughout the country who have faced that terrible dilemma. I trust the Minister of State will take from my remarks that the time has come for an agenda for Alzheimer's. If that could be married to the work of the Minister of State, so much the better because much of his work is relevant in this regard. I commend the Minister of State on his work as well.

It would be wrong of me to finish my contribution by not restating my admiration for the years of work carried out by the staff in St. Luke's, including the work of the medical and nursing staff, the ancillary staff and the Friends of St. Luke's, who have set up so many benefits for those who went to that hospital. One such benefit was the facility whereby one could go and stay in a nice guest house on the grounds. Relatives could be near their loved ones who were entering on an unknown journey and who would surely benefit from the warmth and love of their dear ones as they embarked on it. There can be no higher accolade than that the Friends of St. Luke's have stated that they will continue their good work for patients on the road ahead, no matter what else happens.

The Minister, Deputy Harney, referred to other aspects of the debate, including matters relating to the Department of Social Protection and the culmination of the infectious disease special payments. I refer to one other matter. I understand from what the Minister has stated in the debate that there is to be a specialised centre for the treatment of pancreatic cancer in St. Vincent's Hospital. I was very pleased to read of that development. Such a centre is much needed. I commend the Department of Health and Children, Professor Keane, the Minister and all who work within the Department and the HSE on the dedication that has given rise to the setting up of all of these centres of excellence. Make no mistake about it, that project - the centres of excellence - would not have succeeded if somebody very determined and with a strong political will and engagement had not been at the helm, but succeed it did. I wish all those who work in St. Luke's well but my abiding wish is that the fine work carried out there is not smothered by the entrails of the vast bureaucracy which is the HSE.

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