Aindrias Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

While people are languishing on waiting lists they have diminished quality of life. Their distress and anxiety must be unimaginable. There is significant suffering and it is cruelly compounded by that long wait. Those outpatient waiting lists are causing delayed diagnosis of cancers and other serious conditions. While we can consider the different statistics, I am seeing the real people who are calling into my clinic, the person hobbling who has been waiting two years to have a hip operation etc. Also, in the case of gynaecological services, I dealt with a woman who was in the bathroom in a puddle of blood and I had to phone for an ambulance for her. She was on a waiting list for well over a year and had to repeatedly go to the accident and emergency department until she finally received treatment. It is not acceptable.

When I raised the issue of the gynaecological services in Cork with the Minister earlier this year, I pointed out to him the unused theatres in Cork and that theatre in that hospital remains unused. I pointed out to him earlier this year the need for additional consultants in Cork. Of the 28 who were appointed, no consultant was appointed in Cork and there still is not a consultant on the ground, even though the Minister has figures for one to take up position sometime next year. When I raised the issue of the gynaecological services in Cork with the Minister last summer, there were 1,213 waiting for those services for more than a year. That number has risen to 1,628. There needs to be action, not reports. Services need to be delivered for those people in Cork.

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