Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The answer is "Yes". There are informal discussions going on. It is something I discussed with the Irish Nurses and Midwives Organisation, INMO, when I was at its conference, and the chief executive and I raised it when we spoke at the Fórsa conference. Most importantly around this, the people I hear supporting this are the healthcare professionals themselves. They are fully aware that this is where we need to go. I had a meeting with emergency department consultants from around the country in the last two weeks. The point several of them made was that in hospitals which are achieving this, such as Waterford, Tullamore, Portlaoise and others, with senior decision-makers onsite but, critically, with access to radiology, discharge teams in the hospitals and, to the Deputy's point, community teams working as well - it does not mean that every service has to be running through Saturday and Sunday but it is around patient flow - it really is making a big difference.

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