Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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179. To ask the Minister for Health the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland hospital group's winter capacity plans to deal with the busiest time of the year; the measures that are in place to deal with capacity at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda in County Louth; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42237/15]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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Additional funding of €16.9m (€8.9m revenue and €8m capital) was provided in July to support acute hospitals over the winter period. This ‘winter capacity’ funding is being applied to a range of initiatives including additional bed capacity. In preparation for the 2015/16 winter period, hospital groups have provided comprehensive winter resilience plans to the HSE, outlining how they will implement an integrated approach across primary, community, social and acute services to manage winter pressures. This approach is intended both to avoid unnecessary admissions to acute hospitals and to expedite discharges from hospital efficiently.

A total of 135 hospital beds which had been closed for refurbishment or for infection control purposes during 2015 are to be re-opened by the end of November. As of the 19th November, 91 of these beds are already open. A further 301 beds are being added to support the acute hospital system over the winter period across various locations, including Limerick, Drogheda, Galway and North Dublin - all areas which are regularly identified in the media as pressure points for the delivery of emergency care. All of these actions are intended to enable the HSE to deliver the objective of reducing the number of patients with Delayed Discharges by one-third to less than 500, and the number of patients on trolleys in EDs waiting for admission for over nine hours to fewer than 70.

In relation to the RCSI Hospital Group winter capacity plan, as this is a service matter, I have requested that the HSE respond to the deputy directly. If you have not received a reply from the HSE within 15 working days please contact my Private Office and my officials will follow the matter up.