Catherine Byrne (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have taken note of all the questions the Deputy has asked. Unfortunately I cannot answer them for him, but I will say from the reply the Minister gave that it is good news that University Hospital Limerick will have a new emergency department in the first quarter of 2017 and I will ask him to come back with a specific date if that is possible. I also acknowledge, as the Minister has done in his reply, that the other hospitals in the region are helping out at a critical time when patients' needs are rising, people are getting older and more people are attending the emergency department. It is imperative that we inform people that where there are other facilities within a county, people should also use those. They might be only step-down facilities and there might be units that are not fully equipped to deal with emergencies, so only those cases that need to go to the emergency department should go there. I will relay all the Deputy's questions to the Minister and I will make sure he will come back to him on the specific questions, particularly around the date, because I cannot answer that. As the Deputy heard in the statement and as he acknowledged himself, there is a crisis and the Minister fully acknowledges that.

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