Erin McGreehan (Louth, Fianna Fail)

I have a very clear ask of the Taoiseach. I want further investment in our two hospitals in County Louth, namely, Louth County Hospital in Dundalk and Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda. As the Taoiseach knows, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda is completely overwhelmed. It was never designed to cope with the massive population growth that has been seen across County Louth, County Meath and the north-east region. Sadly, elective surgeries are sometimes delayed. Waiting lists are growing. Patients are left waiting and procedures that should be routine are being delayed.

We need increased numbers of staff to ensure that care can be completed and delivered seven days a week. The staff in both hospitals work incredibly well under the serious pressure they are experiencing. They deliver high-quality healthcare but, because there is an inadequate bed base in Drogheda, we are at a huge loss. Louth County Hospital sits there and is underutilised despite having infrastructure, a footprint and a location that could potentially support regional elective care.

I welcome recent projects such as the ENT procedures, the EuroFlow clinic and the new procedure room that is planned for next year. These are steps in the right direction but we can and must go further. Louth County Hospital has succeeded in everything it has been asked to do in recent years, going way beyond expectations and delivering high-quality care to patients.

I want to look at every avenue alongside the HSE and the RSCI to see how we can create more capacity in both hospitals to deliver more specialties and more care for people. Potentially, we could look at Dundalk becoming a surgical hub in the north east. As we know, hubs are being rolled out in Cork, Galway, Dublin and Waterford but there is nothing in the entire north east region. A surgical hub in Dundalk could take pressure off Drogheda. It would allow a focus on acute and emergency care and would provide faster and fairer access to elective procedures for patients. This is a suggestion. The basic problem is that Drogheda does not have the capacity to deal with the patients it has in a growing region. For example, Louth has had an 8% increase in population since 2016. Dundalk south is the most populous LEA in the county, with more than 40,000 people, but the hospital infrastructure has practically stood still. I ask the Taoiseach for a positive and huge investment in our hospitals in the near future.

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