Harney backs Keane to become next HSE chief

THE health minister has indicated her support for Professor Tom Keane to succeed Professor Brendan Drumm when the job of chief executive of the Health Service Executive (HSE) becomes vacant next year.

Speaking at the official opening yesterday of the regional cancer centre in the HSE South, Minister Mary Harney said she would be delighted if Prof Keane chose not to return to his post in Canada.

Ms Harney was asked if she would like to see Prof Keane take over when Prof Drumm steps down next year. “There is nobody more than me that would love to see Prof Keane staying in Ireland. He has done a remarkable job. But that will be a matter for Prof Keane, it’s not a matter for me.”

She said she would not be involved in choosing a successor to Prof Drumm. It would be “an entirely independent process which the board of the HSE will establish”.

The post was advertised last Friday and the closing date for applications is January 15 next.

Prof Keane, who is director of the National Cancer Control Programme (NCCP), refused to be drawn on whether he was interested in the post.

“There’s always speculation,” he said. “That’s what the Irish media live by. I have to go back to Canada in the springtime.”

In relation to the successful roll-out of the NCCP – achieved inside its two-year timeframe – Prof Keane said: “Most of the goals we set ourselves have been achieved. There are probably some that are going to take a few more months to roll out, but we’re substantially there.”

Prof Keane has overseen the centralisation of cancer care from 33 hospitals into eight designated centres and yesterday marked the completion of that programme with the official opening of the eighth centre at Cork University Hospital (CUH). The new centre will be the largest in the country treating 10,000 patients annually and it is also set to become joint national centre for brain cancer, in conjunction with Beaumont Hospital in Dublin. The centre is currently exceeding the requirement to see 95% of all urgent cancer patients within two weeks and non-urgent patients within 12 weeks.

Yesterday Ms Harney said the threat of cancer misdiagnosis could never be ruled out, but the higher the volume of patients being treated at a centre, the better the outcome. She said it also made investment easier.

In relation to some resistance to transferring breast cancer surgery from the South Infirmary Victoria University Hospital (SIVUH) to CUH, Ms Harney said: “I can understand why people in Sligo had an objection to perhaps moving to Galway or Dublin, but nobody could ever explain how two hospitals in the same city couldn’t work together.”

She said the Breastcheck cancer screening service would continue at the SIVUH for the foreseeable future.