Michael Harty (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

As the Taoiseach quite rightly says, the difficulty is not uniquely related to the Mid West Hospital Group. Roscommon has been striving to extend the opening period of its medical assessment unit from five days per week to seven days per week. The Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Deputy Naughten, has been pursuing this since he entered government. Unfortunately, he has not been successful so far.

Medical assessment units and model 2 hospitals are critical to health care delivery. Not only do they deliver medical assessment services but they also deliver day care, theatre services and diagnostic services. In Ennis, the theatre is idle for in excess of 50% of the time it is manned. The CT scanner there is operated for three hours per day on a five-day week basis. Therefore, it is operated for 15 hours per week. It does not work at weekends. This is a complete waste of resources. Model 2 hospitals have the capacity to develop and take pressure from our acute services. They have the capacity to supply services that are essential to patients without their having to go to accident and emergency services, which would clog them up and add to trolley queues.

See this speech in context