David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his reply. I fully accept his point that any decision to delay admission for treatment is not taken lightly. I accept that hospital management do not take those decisions lightly because they recognise, as the Minister of State did in his response, there is an additional trauma for patients who are already traumatised because of the type of surgery they are in line for. The reply also states that these decisions are made to ensure a safe environment, with safe delivery of care for all patients. Again, I have no quarrel with that because, if it is the case that the critical beds are taken up and there is a higher demand than the capacity available, then, obviously, hospital management and staff have to make decisions, and decisions they probably do not want to make but are forced into making.

My main point, which was not addressed in the response, is that there is a shortage of critical care beds. I ask that the Minister of State takes this up with the Minister, Deputy Harris. This will happen over and over again unless we put more critical care beds into University Hospital Waterford. The Minister of State's response acknowledges there has been a massive 11% increase in demand because it is a university regional hospital, which services the south east. If the population grows, then demand will increase, and this means the capacity has to increase, which means more critical beds are needed.

I accept hospital management have a difficult job and that it has to make these decisions, and I have no quarrel with it whatsoever. As I said, the staff were very pleasant. They were excellent to the patients who had to be sent home and they were very conscious of the trauma patients were going through, to their credit. However, I have to press the Minister of State again on this point. We need more critical beds in the hospital in Waterford. I hope he will take that message directly to the Minister for Health.

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