Private hospital ‘will treat public patients in weeks’

WATERFORD’S new private hospital, the Whitfield Clinic, will open its doors to its first patients next week and is confident it will be able to provide radiotherapy for public patients within weeks.

Hospital bosses say they are on the verge of a deal with private health insurer, the VHI, which will see thousands of patients qualify for cover for a variety of procedures at the €50 million state-of-the-art facility.

A deal has already been brokered with insurer VIVAS but patients who have BUPA cover will have to await their fate until an ongoing risk equalisation wrangle is resolved, the hospital’s developer, Dr Jim Madden, has revealed.

The hospital has opened for business on Waterford’s Cork Road and its first patients are due through its doors on Wednesday, November 1.

Private patients requiring radiotherapy are due to begin receiving treatment at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Centre (UPMC) Whitfield Cancer Centre within days. And it is hoped that a service agreement can be brokered with the HSE within weeks, a move which would see public patients also getting the treatment they need at the facility.

Hospital bosses say they hope to be in a position to treat public radiotherapy patients before Christmas, once a service agreement has been reached with the HSE.

Local cancer campaigner Sheila McGrath said public patients must not be forced to endure torturous round trips to Dublin and Cork for treatment, while passing the door of the private unit.

In the course of a heated debate on radiotherapy services on local radio station WLR FM yesterday, she said that cancer patients still want radiotherapy at Waterford Regional Hospital and will not be fobbed off.

“Our cancer patients are still travelling. We must put all our energy into getting radiotherapy at Waterford Regional Hospital. We have protested to get it and the government is not going to get away with providing radiotherapy at Whitfield alone,” she said.

Cancer campaigner Dick Roche says he is fully supportive of public patients being treated at the private clinic. “I believe that in the next few weeks the HSE will announce that public patients will be treated at Whitfield.

“What needs to happen on top of that is that Mary Harney will deliver radiotherapy for WRH. We will continue to campaign for this and ensure that it is delivered,” he said.