Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Health if he will require the Health Service Executive to deliver on its agreed commitment to extend the capacity of the St. Vincent’s Hospital Cystic Fibrosis facility to 34 beds; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [57013/12]

James Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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St Vincent's University Hospital (SVUH) is the designated National Adult Referral Centre for patients with Cystic Fibrosis (CF). The new Nutley Wing at the hospital, built at a cost of just under €29m and opened this summer, is designed to provide a state of the art clinical building which includes up to date isolation facilities with accommodation for people with cystic fibrosis. In the new unit 20 beds are set aside for patients with cystic fibrosis. Each bed is in a separate room with its own toilet and washing facilities. The 20 beds include 4 complete isolation rooms. The unit also provides a dedicated CF Day Unit, containing offices, treatment rooms, together with 10 single day treatment rooms, each with en-suite sanitary facilities for treating patients with cystic fibrosis.

Under a protocol for the treatment of CF patients at SVUH, signed off in July 2012 with the hospital, the HSE, Department of Health and CFA, up to 34 isolation beds will be available in the new wing.and the 10-bed day unit will be used effectively to help ensure that patients are treated in the optimum setting. Except in certain circumstances, the additional 14 single inpatient rooms when required will be located in the Nutley Wing and these rooms will be grouped together as far as possible. 1-2 inpatient rooms in the Nutley Wing will be kept available at all times for emergency admissions. In circumstances where the emergency admission rooms have already been utilised and all the other inpatient rooms in the Nutley Wing are occupied, patients with CF will be accommodated elsewhere in clinically appropriate single rooms until such time as a room becomes available in the Nutley Wing and then the patient will be transferred there as a priority.

The position with regard to the facilities in St Vincent's University Hospital, Dublin for patients with Cystic Fibrosis is being continuously monitored and the hospital, the HSE and the Cystic Fibrosis Association of Ireland continue to engage constructively to ensure that the needs of patients with Cystic Fibrosis who are acutely ill and require admission to the hospital are met.