Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail)
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700. To ask the Minister for Health the reason the Midland Regional Hospital, Portlaoise, County Laois, has been designated as a model 3 hospital; his views on the Health Information and Quality Authority’s assertion that the hospital has not been resourced to safely provide services at a level that would be expected of a model 3 hospital; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20456/15]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Portlaoise Hospital currently provides the range of acute services of a Model 3 hospital. Reviews of services at the hospital point to the need for reconfiguration of some services, to ensure that patients are treated in the most appropriate setting by specialist staff that can meet their needs.

The future of the hospital is as a constituent hospital within the Dublin Midlands Hospital Group. That Group also includes St James's; Tallaght; Tullamore; Naas and the Coombe Hospitals. Any change to services at Portlaoise Hospital will be undertaken in a planned and orderly manner. This will be guided by what is best in terms of patient safety and outcomes and will take account of existing patient flows, demands in other hospitals and the need to develop particular services at Portlaoise in the context of overall service reorganisation in the Dublin Midlands Hospital Group. The timing and scope of such changes will have regard for the capacity and capability of other services within the Group particularly in the short term. This work will be overseen by the Joint Steering Group comprised of representatives from Portlaoise and other hospitals in the Group, including the Group CEO, Dr. Susan O’Reilly.

In relation to resources, the 2015 allocation for Portlaoise is €49.7m. Funding levels for hospitals are determined and set out in the HSE Annual Service Plan within the context of total funding provided to the HSE. Hospital funding is not framed or specifically determined by categorisation or designation but rather is based on the range and complexity of services provided by each hospital and by their level of activity. Activity Based Funding (ABF) is a new model for funding public hospital care. ABF is intended to ensure a fairer system of resource allocation to hospitals. Hospitals will be funded based on the quantity and quality of the services they deliver to patients, and will be encouraged, subject to overall budgetary ceilings, to pursue the most cost-effective means of achieving this standard of performance. Full roll-out of ABF is a multi-year project and a phased approach to implementation is being taken in order to ensure operational stability in hospitals.