Recruitment ban ‘should be broken’ over A&E crisis

THE Government may have to lift its public sector recruitment ban, if the crisis facing emergency services in the Mid-West is to be averted, Labour junior minister Jan O’Sullivan has warned.

The party’s former spokesperson on health has said it was “inconceivable” that a region with a population of 361,000 people could be left without 24-hour emergency hospital cover.

The junior minister in the Department of Foreign Affairs was reacting to reports the emergency department at the Mid-Western Regional Hospital faces closure at night time from next month, due to a shortage of doctors.

It was reported in the Sunday Business Post that the chairman of the hospital’s medical board, Dr Sandy Fraser, recently informed HSE boss Cathal Magee that patients attending emergency from July 1 may have to be diverted to either Cork or Galway during night-time hours due to a chronic shortage of non-consultant hospital doctors.

In a statement issued by the HSE, a spokesperson described the recruitment of non-consultant hospital doctors as a “challenging national issue”.

“We continue to work through the process in terms of recruitment campaigns at national and international level,” the statement read.

“The public can be assured that the issue is receiving attention at the highest level and we are engaged with all the parties including the medical colleges which oversee the training of junior doctors, the Medical Council, the Department of Health and Children and the Minister for Health.”

The spokesperson added that the recruitment process has not concluded and insisting “every avenue is being explored”.

Limerick-based Ms O’Sullivan said the real issue at the hospital was staffing and said the recruitment moratorium should be broken if necessary.

“If it’s necessary to break the moratorium to ensure we have hospitals at night time in the Mid-Western Regional Hospital then they will have to break the moratorium,” she said.

The minister of state said she plans to discuss the crisis facing the Mid-Western Regional Hospital with the Minster for Health Dr James Reilly today.

“It’s inconceivable to think that there wouldn’t be accident and emergency at night time in the whole of the Mid-West and the Regional Hospital obviously is the place, now that the others have closed their A&E departments at night time,” she said. “There’s absolutely no way whatsoever that we can allow this to happen.”