Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

It provides an important discharge facility for patients of the Mater hospital, Connolly Hospital, Beaumont Hospital and other hospitals across the city. It acts as a bridge between the acute hospital system and people returning home after a stroke, people with dementia or an acute intervention in the hospital system. It helps people who are well but who need that bridge to facilitate their discharge into the community.

A combination of serious issues have arisen in recent weeks due to the cuts to home help being matched with the reduction in the number of beds. A total of 27 beds in St. Mary's Hospital have been cut. They include eight community respite beds that provide positive support for people in the community who might have dementia or a disability and 19 other beds that provide a spill-over for many of the hospitals across the Dublin region. The beds are a significant loss. The perception among staff at the hospital is that this is a cost-containment measure and another example of mismanagement on the part of the HSE of the overall budget whereby the acute hospitals absorb the majority of funding. The safety valve that exists for so many elderly people is now being removed. They will be left on trolleys in the hospital system for longer despite being medically well. What has the HSE done in terms of forward planning so that such beds are kept open? The very essence of Sláintecare and Government policy is to keep community beds open and to enhance the capacity for healthcare in the community not to undermine it. The cut is aggressive. It is a blunt instrument in terms of the approach to Sláintecare and it deserves a proper explanation. It requires a reversal of the cut or a replacement of beds because it will adversely impact on communities across Dublin.

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