Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Along with other acute hospitals, University Hospital Waterford has prepared a capacity plan to help address the expected increased demand for services this winter. Measures include opening additional beds as required, managing patient flow, appropriate discharges, internal surge capacity both in terms of beds and staff and prioritising diagnostics for inpatients to facilitate earlier discharge.

In addition, University Hospital Waterford and HSE community services will put a community intervention team in place by December for the Waterford region. This is a nurse-led team which works with other health professionals and services in an effort to provide a rapid response for certain patients with an acute illness episode. Such patients require short interventions, usually under 72 hours, in the community or at home such as blood monitoring, fluids or IV. The availability of the specialist team will, I expect, reduce hospital attendance and enable some patients to be discharged earlier.

University Hospital Waterford has an average of 15 delayed discharges. The hospital works closely with HSE community services so that patients are discharged as quickly as possible to appropriate accommodation. Suitable patients on the delayed discharge list are prioritised for home care packages. The hospital also works with community and ambulance services to ensure that weekend discharges are facilitated. While the additional supports provided to University Hospital Waterford do not include additional acute beds under recent proposals, 48 extra beds will be available across the South-South West Hospital Group.

The community nursing unit project at St. Patrick's Hospital is a priority project. A design review was completely recently. At this stage, it is expected that the planning application could be submitted before the end of the year.

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