Results 19,801-19,820 of 24,635 for speaker:Mary Harney

Written Answers — Cancer Incidence: Cancer Incidence (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The National Cancer Registry has routinely collected data on county of residence for all incidences of cancer since 1994. These data have been published in a number of reports, including Cancer in Ireland 1994-2000 and two all-Ireland cancer reports All-Ireland Cancer Statistics 1994-1996 and All-Ireland Cancer Statistics 1998-2000. Up-to-date tables describing cancer incidence by site, sex...

Written Answers — Medical Cards: Medical Cards (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: I have made significant improvements to the way in which an applicant's eligibility for medical cards and GP visit cards is assessed. In January 2005, I increased the income guidelines used in the assessment of medical card applications by 7.5%. In June 2005, it was apparent that the effect of rising income in our successful economy meant that the target of 30,000 additional medical cards and...

Written Answers — Hospital Hygiene: Hospital Hygiene (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Deputy's question relates to the management and delivery of health and personal social services, which are the responsibility of the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Accordingly, my Department has requested the parliamentary affairs division of the executive to have a reply issued directly to the Deputy.

Written Answers — Hospitals Building Programme: Hospitals Building Programme (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Deputy's question relates to the management and delivery of health and personal social services, which are the responsibility of the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Accordingly, my Department has requested the parliamentary affairs division of the executive to arrange to have this matter investigated and to have a reply issued directly to the Deputy.

Written Answers — Hospital Services: Hospital Services (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Deputy's question relates to the management and delivery of health and personal social services, which are the responsibility of the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Accordingly, my Department has requested the parliamentary affairs division of the executive to arrange to have this matter investigated and to have a reply issued directly to the Deputy.

Written Answers — Nursing Home Subventions: Nursing Home Subventions (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Government has agreed the key elements of a scheme for the repayment of long stay charges for publicly funded residential care. All those fully eligible persons who were wrongly charged and are alive and the estates of all those who were wrongly charged and died since 9 December 1998 will have the charges repaid in full. The scheme will not allow for repayments to the estates of those who...

Written Answers — Health Services: Health Services (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Deputy's question relates to the management and delivery of health and personal social services, which are the responsibility of the Health Service Executive under the Health Act 2004. Accordingly, my Department has requested the parliamentary affairs division of the executive to arrange to have this matter investigated and to have a reply issued directly to the Deputy.

Written Answers — Departmental Expenditure: Departmental Expenditure (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Department of Health and Children Vote surrendered a surplus to the Exchequer for each of the years 1998 to 2005. The following table sets out the amounts surrendered in each year. Year Gross Expenditure Saving Appropriations in Aid Buoyancy Net Expenditure Surrendered â'¬m â'¬m â'¬m 1998 0.504 2.058 2.562 1999 0.795 9.694 10.489 ...

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The HSE is responsible for hiring consultants and Comhairle na nOspidéal has been subsumed into the HSE since the end of December last, which makes sense. Consultants are currently contractors in the health care system and are not employees of the hospitals. We wish to move to them being employees. A public-only contract commits the individual to work on all patients that come into a...

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The Deputy appears to misunderstand what is happening. Everybody is entitled to access our public hospital system and I wish to see that continue. However, I wish to see patients selected into a public hospital system on the basis of medical need, not on the basis of whether they have private health insurance. This is what currently happens. There are 2,500 private beds in the public hospital...

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: If I take 1,000 private beds out of the public hospital system and convert them to public use that would be a major achievement. Deputies opposite seem to suggest I leave it as it is.

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: Every party supports tax relief for films and other things such as urban renewal which have all been worthy schemes that have achieved fantastic results. We do not, however, seem to be capable of supporting, through tax measures, sensible investment in the health care system. If we can attract investment into the health service through private financing we would be very foolish not to...

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: Converting private beds to public beds is nothing to do with the American system. The Deputy does not know what he is talking about.

Hospitals Building Programme. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: He was a big investor in a private hospital, or am I wrong?

Pharmacy Regulations. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: The practice of pharmacy is governed by the Pharmacy Acts 1875 to 1962. I am aware that the current fitness to practise provisions in these Acts are inadequate for the modern practice of pharmacy. On foot of the recommendations of the pharmacy review group I obtained Government approval in June 2005 to commence the process of drafting, as a priority, new pharmacy legislation to allow, among...

Pharmacy Regulations. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: I accept that the legislation governing the regulation of pharmacy is unsatisfactory. It dates back to 1962 and much has changed in the intervening period. At a recent event I was told by the incoming president of the pharmaceutical society that when his father was its president many years ago, he expected the new law during that year. That was 30 years ago. I do not know why we have not been...

Hospital Services. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: It is regrettable that some patients have their operations postponed and I recognise that this can cause inconvenience and stress for them and their families. Every effort continues to be made by the HSE and hospitals to keep cancellations to a minimum. However, due to fluctuating demands on the acute hospital system, in some instances it is necessary to reschedule planned treatment,...

Hospital Services. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: It is always unacceptable when somebody has elective surgery cancelled. To put the matter in perspective, the percentage of cancellations is between 2% and 3% per annum, although that is still too many. I was reading that in the United Kingdom 15% of elective work is done by the private sector for these kinds of reasons. The HSE recently commissioned process mapping exercises of ten of our...

Hospital Services. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: These difficulties do not arise in the private system which, to be fair, does not deal with trauma and accident and emergency cases, which cause many of the difficulties in the public system. I acknowledge that the health care system is experiencing a major shortage of consultants, which is why it is extremely important to get a new contract of employment that suits the public health care...

Accident and Emergency Services. (31 Jan 2006)

Mary Harney: I do not accept that the accident and emergency action plan has failed. On the contrary, a wide-ranging approach has been adopted by the Health Service Executive to improve access to accident and emergency services, improve patient flows through accident and emergency departments, reduce waiting times, free up acute beds and provide appropriate longer-term care for patients outside the acute...