Hospital paid almost €500k to two firms run by HSE doctors to tackle waiting lists

Staff at Naas General Hospital were also paid 'significantly higher' amounts to work on projects to tackle waiting lists. File picture

Naas General Hospital paid almost €500,000 to two companies run by HSE doctors to tackle long patient waiting lists, an internal audit has found.

Staff at the Naas hospital were also paid “significantly higher” amounts to work on projects to tackle waiting lists.

The details emerged during an audit of how National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) monies were spent in Naas hospital. The NTPF funds HSE hospitals to tackle waiting lists with around €200m a year. 

The funding covers outsourcing to private health centres, or insourcing where hospitals have patients seen on-site but outside normal hours.

Concerns have been growing around oversight of this money, including at Naas, Kerry University Hospital, Children’s Health Ireland, St James hospital and Beaumont hospital. 

Naas hospital received €10.3m in funding, including around €2m for insourcing. It paid €473,320 to two separate companies for waiting list projects. 

These had company directors who were consultants working at Tallaght University Hospital. The payments were for clinics and consultations.

Consultants paid a fee per patient

In addition, the audit found consultants on NTPF projects were paid a fee per patient which is not how HSE salaries or overtime rates normally work. These “significantly higher” rates led to an “inefficient use of public funds”, the audit found. 

It cautioned that this creates governance risks because it “may incentivise activity to shift away from core hours and outside approved renumeration frameworks”.

For care of 27 patients on January 4 last year, there was a gap of €3,039 between payments made and HSE approved rates. In another case, for 23 patients treated on October 5 last year, it identified a gap of €1,782.

The hospital management was unable to confirm all this work was outside of core clinic hours.

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The audit states Naas hospital has accepted all recommendations from the audit. It implemented processes before the audit started to address the issues.

The audit team has advised all HSE regional executive officers to ensure funding applications have a value-for-money assessment. 

This should include matching pay for consultants with approved public pay and overtime rates.

The HSE also released an internal audit of its data protection transformation programme. It noted failures can lead to patients’ private data being stolen or misused.

The section on timelines and budget is marked at a moderate risk, however, details are redacted. Overall, it found the project is “operating well”.

Naas General Hospital and the HSE Dublin and Midlands region said “significant work” has been done to implement the recommendations and this continues. It will work with the NTPF and HSE nationally to “ensure that all future activity is fully compliant with national policy and governance requirements”.

In relation to the data protection programme, the HSE said all the recommendations have been implemented.