Harney urged to look to Sweden for health reform model
Dr Ed Walsh, a former director of Bons Secours Hospitals, said the Swedish health service suffered the same defects that are manifest in Ireland’s health system.
Dr Walsh said: “In Sweden in the early 1990s they had the same problems we have of escalating costs, patient dissatisfaction and huge waiting lists.”
He said the Swedish government switched the healthcare motto of Public Health Care Provided by Public Hospitals to Public Health Care provided by Private Companies.
This, he said, encouraged a huge development in private health care.
“What happens is that the public patient receives a voucher. If a person is getting a hip replacement, that patient gets a voucher from the State and can shop around among the private hospitals doing that kind of surgery. And it has led to the hospitals competing to do more operations.
“The State retains responsibility for quality and the State can withdraw a hospital’s licence if standards are not up to certain requirements.”
He said waiting lists in Sweden had vanished, unit costs dropped and patient satisfaction has gone up. “The patient is king in Sweden because he is the person with the voucher. Mary Harney should look at this model,” Dr Walsh said.
Dr Walsh said Limerick presents a huge market opportunity for a private hospital.
A plan by Bon Secours Hospitals and BUPA to develop a private hospital on an eight-acre site on the Mid Western Regional Hospital campus, failed to get off the ground.
Dr Ed Walsh, then a Bons Secours board member, said: “It was most unfortunate that this development didn’t take place and the VHI were of no great help. The VHI, I believe, were not prepared to be supportive and raised questions whether VHI patients would be able to get cover in the proposed private hospital.”
That, he said, undermined the whole business plan for the proposed 100-bed private hospital.
He said a private hospital in Limerick would benefit both public and private patients.
