HSE urged to publish ambulance service report

The head of the cross-party Oireachtas health committee has urged the HSE to immediately publish its detailed review of ambulance service gaps across the country, after concerns the investigation has been shelved.

The HSE capacity review was set up last February following a series of high-profile ambulance tragedies, and was tasked with uncovering service gaps, explaining where ambulances should be placed and ensuring call-out target response times are met.

At the launch of a separate Hiqa report last December —which found one-in-five ambulances are too old to be on the road — the watchdog’s chief executive, Phelim Quinn, said the HSE report would be published before Christmas. However, while a draft section of the overall report — which said Ireland is too rural to meet response times, and questioned whether patients should automatically be taken to hospital — was leaked in January, the investigation itself has yet to be revealed.