Brain victims’group urges unit go-ahead

A GROUP working with brain injury victims has strongly urged the health authorities to accept a multi-million euro offer of medical equipment.

Top US neurosurgeon, Patrick Kelly, is willing to donate millions worth of specialist equipment to a proposed neurosurgery unit in Galway but his offer has been ignored for three years by the health authorities here.

Headway Ireland, which provides training for people with brain injuries, wants the Department of Health to accept the offer. "The offer of $4m is wonderfully generous and it would be a travesty and a shame if Ireland couldn't benefit from it.

"People with brain injuries are badly in need of post surgery services, few of which exist, especially in rural areas," a Headway Ireland spokesperson said.

It emerged this week that the offer of $4m in medical equipment is in doubt. A spokesperson for Mr Kelly said it was becoming increasingly difficult to maintain support for the Galway unit.

Mr Kelly's spokesperson Pat Dwyer said the offer is hanging by a thread because the department is so slow to accept it. "So many lives could be saved and so many brain injuries with consequent and very costly care avoided at savings to the Exchequer, if this unit was established," Ms Dwyer said.

"We are talking about the difference between returning back into their communities and long-term taxpayer-paid care. Neurosurgery is just about the most cost effective surgery you could find," she said.

There is no neurosurgery unit in the west of Ireland, and injured people have to be treated at specialist units in Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, or Cork University Hospital.

The Western Neurosurgery Campaign said the growing population in the region highlights the need for a specialist unit in the west.

The Department of Health has referred Mr Kelly's offer to Comhairle na nOspideál, which is carrying out a review of neuroservices nationwide.

A Department of Health spokesperson said last night this review still had not been completed. "The minister acknowledges this generous offer but we have to wait until comhairle finishes its work," the spokesperson said.