Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am grateful to the Ceann Comhairle for selecting this topical issue. I welcome the Minister of State.

The HSE national service plan for 2012 includes a commitment to roll out a new kind of treatment for diabetes in children, including the use of insulin pumps. Five centres were identified - three in Dublin, one in Cork and a shared service between Limerick and Galway. The target completion date was the end of the third quarter, that is, the end of September. There are two issues - one is the restriction of this new insulin pump treatment to children under five years of age and the other is the discrepancies in the treatment of children in different regions.

One often hears complaints of a Dublin-centric attitude. Galway children must travel to Temple Street children's hospital in Dublin to see a consultant six or seven times a year in order to use the insulin pump. As a Galway Deputy, I will speak about regional deficiencies. I warmly welcome the announcement at the start of this year of an additional 1.2 diabetes nurse specialist posts in Limerick and Galway, with a diabetes dietician also shared between the Mid-Western Regional Hospital and University College Hospital Galway. These posts were to be filled and operational by June 2012 but this did not happen. Following representations and a delay of several weeks, I received news this afternoon - by strange coincidence - that the posts will be advertised in the coming weeks and will be in place by the start of 2013. Despite the delay, I can see the benefit in this.

Advocacy groups suggest Galway is the poor relation when it comes to urban areas and diabetic treatment. However, the good news I have mentioned does not solve another issue, namely, the apparent differentiation between age groups. The new insulin pump treatment will only be introduced for children under five years of age. I am concerned about those over that age. A constituent approached me on behalf of his 11 year old daughter. The girl requires four or five injections of insulin a day for type 1 diabetes. This caused an amount of trauma to the body to the extent that the abdomen suffered bruising. The injections were administered subsequently to her arms and currently to the back of her legs. This is of major concern to the girl and her parents who want to know when they will have access to an insulin pump. She is an 11 year old in Galway and I ask whether this treatment will continue to be available only in Dublin. It is a major regional issue.

No one likes to talk about the cost of health care but we must be practical. We must use the funding we allocate to health care to its optimal use. By not extending insulin pump treatment to all children, we will be penny rich and pound foolish.

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