Results 26,381-26,400 of 46,575 for speaker:Simon Harris

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: On HPV testing, I asked the Health Information and Quality Authority, HIQA, to carry out a health technology assessment on this and it came back recommending HPV testing. I decided in February that we would move ahead with the introduction of that later this year. I have asked that that be accelerated. It is a big body of work. It will also provide the opportunity for the reconfiguration...

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I will ask that question of the HSE and revert to Deputy Broughan. I envisage that it is likely that Dr. Scally's report will signpost any areas identified as needing improvements, make recommendations and outline to us what further body of work needs to be done. I want to take the opportunity, on the record of the Dáil, to reiterate the point about screening not being a diagnostic...

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: In the interests of providing accurate information, I will have to check that. I do not have a note available to me about that. I will check for the Deputy if the mammogram machines have been upgraded since he last asked the question of my predecessor and will revert to him directly.

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Waiting Lists (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I agree with the Deputy that we need to do more about this issue, but I will give some figures, given the considerable commentary on the matter in recent months. We are making significant progress. In the 12-month period between April 2017 and April 2018, the total number fell from 10,304 patients waiting to 7,818, a decrease of more than 20%. On the length of time people have to wait, 744...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Waiting Lists (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I will take the Deputy up on his offer. I do not want anyone to work in a silo. There is enough work to go around. Given the ageing demographic profile, demand for ophthalmological services will only increase. The report of the primary care eye service review group is a good body of work, with people working in the community and acute hospital settings coming together to draw up what was...

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I assure the Deputy that rolling out the package of supports is a priority. Not only did we appoint a national lead within the HSE to co-ordinate it, but we have also instructed that lead to ensure public health nurses are assigned in each of the community healthcare organisations, CHOs, to liaise with the families. I do not want to hear of any woman or her family having to go to a meeting...

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: Not yet.

Other Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: At the request of many Deputies, the laboratories we use and their performance are specifically within Dr. Scally's terms of reference because I do not feel qualified nor, I respectfully suggest, is anyone in the House to make these adjudications. All of the laboratories being used meet international standards and follow the quality guidelines set for the programme. The clinical advice is...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: We are all aware that Dr. Scally is independent in his work, which is right and proper. We also all agreed to the terms of reference and they are very clear on the work Dr. Scally is to set about doing. He has shown himself to be well able to get to the bottom of serious issues. While I can absolutely understand how people who have been so badly let down cannot have confidence in elements...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I agree with the Deputy on the documentation and review findings required. I will follow up on the matter directly immediately after priority questions. For those who are watching and to have confidence in the screening programme and that information will be given, it is important to say two things. First, there has been a huge volume of calls in the last few week to the CervicalCheck...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Waiting Lists (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I thank the Deputy for his question. Reducing waiting times for patients for hospital operations and procedures is a key priority for the Government. Cataract surgery is among the most common surgical procedures carried out in the ophthalmology specialty. Through the work of the National Treatment Purchase Fund, NTPF, and the HSE, the overall number of patients waiting for cataract...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Cancer Screening Programmes (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I thank Deputy Kelly for the question and for his work on this important issue in recent weeks and months. I want to say first that in regard to the HSE as a whole, I do not believe the current governance structures are appropriate. I believe the HSE is far too bureaucratic and is not accountable enough. I believe we need to move quickly as an Oireachtas to put in place an independent...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Beds Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I thank Deputy Donnelly. The Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, confirmed to me today that at no point did it refute the capacity review figures and it was represented on the steering group of the review. It has confirmed also that it is very clear that the projections on the two exercises were not comparable. The Deputy is not suggesting they are as the ESRI one did not factor...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I will do that a special courtesy to the Deputy..

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I find it unusual to have to apologise for being courteous to the Deputy but I will take her at her wish. The Deputy is correct in that if we look back to 2007 and compare the figures then to the latest figures, there has been a reduction in the number of community nurses. If the question is pitched in terms of the timelines as the Deputy has done she is correct the figure is down....

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: We are not proposing doing more of the same, hence specifically as part of the public sector pay agreement, the stability agreement, there was another agreement with the INMO that issues relating to recruitment and retention of health care professionals would be the first thing to be considered by the second phase of the Public Service Pay Commission’s work. That work is under way....

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Health Services Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: My mathematics are not brilliant either but the Deputy said she is in the CHO 9 area and I have done a rough calculation. There were 1,971 community nurses there in December 2017 and that had risen to 2,074 in April 2018, which I think is an increase of 103 nurses. I accept the point and am not contesting that we need to continue to do more to get back to where we want to be in respect of...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Beds Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I thank Deputy Donnelly for the question. As the Deputy knows, the Government committed to undertaking a health service capacity review in A Programme for a Partnership Government, and this was published last January. This was the first thorough assessment of capacity needs across the health service for more than a decade. In the following month, 2,600 acute beds and 4,500 social care beds...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Priority Questions: Hospital Beds Data (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: I thank Deputy Donnelly for the question. I welcome that there is now a political consensus in this House that we need more acute hospital beds. That was not the practice in the past, even during the previous economic boom where, and I do not mean this in a party political sense, there was a view, even within senior levels of health service management, that we had too many hospital beds in...

Order of Business (29 May 2018)

Simon Harris: We have two plans. After years of failed policies of reducing the number of hospital beds, we are going to increase the number of hospital beds in the health service so there is an adequate number of beds. That is why we fully funded the bed capacity review to provide 2,500 more acute hospital beds. Second, we are going to build three elective-only hospitals - one in Dublin, one in Galway...