Written answers

Tuesday, 25 June 2013

Department of Health

National Maternity Hospital

Photo of Aengus Ó SnodaighAengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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613. To ask the Minister for Health his plans regarding a national maternity hospital; the site, cost and the timeframe for delivery of a new state of the art maternity hospital [30717/13]

Photo of James ReillyJames Reilly (Dublin North, Fine Gael)
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On Monday 27 May, I announced that the National Maternity Hospital is to be relocated to the St Vincent's University Hospital (SVUH) campus. This will be a state of the art, custom built, modern health care facility. It will provide care to international standards in the most appropriate surroundings, and with access to the facilities and staff of a major acute hospital. The new hospital will be designed to accommodate up to 10,000 births per annum.

The re-location to the SVUH campus is in line with the recommendation of the 2008 KPMG report on maternity and gynaecology services – ie, that the Dublin maternity hospitals should be co-located alongside adult acute services, for optimal clinical outcome. Maternity and adult service co-location provides the mother access to a full range of medical and support services on campus should the need arise. The two hospitals have been working closely, advancing and enhancing links at executive, clinical and departmental level in recent years. Moreover, both hospitals will be part of the Dublin East Hospital Group and in that context they will also be working collaboratively with the other hospitals in the Group.

Although it is not possible to be definitive about time frames at this early stage in the process, it is projected that the new hospital will be complete in 2018. An indicative sum of €150 million has been approved in the HSE’s Capital Plan to enable the project to proceed. Estimated costs will be reviewed at each stage in the process.

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