Sally’s family in donor appeal on awareness day

As transplant delays continue, patients like 16-year-old Sally Nagle spend 10 hours daily on home dialysis, writes Catherine Shanahan.

IN June this year, Irish Kidney Association chief executive Mark Murphy publicly vented his frustration at the appalling situation which had developed at the Limerick dialysis unit in the Mid West Regional Hospital. It was overcrowded to such an extent that patients dependent on haemodialysis for survival were diverted to Tullamore, Kilkenny, Tralee and Galway for treatment — three times a week. Mr Murphy blamed the crisis on lack of planning and decision-making by the Health Service Executive, arguing that overcrowding in Limerick had been well documented for years.

Today, on the ninth European Day for Organ Donation and Awareness, he is equally frustrated. The HSE has had the unpublished National Renal Review Strategy report for eight months. Mr Murphy said it clearly highlights the dialysis problems and the way to solve them, as well as requirements for the next 10 years, but that the review has been “parked” with an expert advisory committee. “I’m concerned it is almost buried and this is the beginning of the end,” he said. His pessimism is heightened by the HSE staff recruitment freeze which he says is delaying the appointment of an additional consultant surgeon at Beaumont to boost the Living Transplant Programme, where just three out of nine promised transplants have so far taken place this year.