'It's brilliant coming in here': Older patients feel right at home with integrated healthcare

HSE ICPOP teams are delivering faster and better care for older people and reducing overcrowding — and patients are finding the experience far more pleasant than hospital 

The Kerry ICPOP team in Tralee. Patients receive much of their care at home but visit the McAuley Unit too. ‘It’s brilliant coming in here,’ one said. ‘Everyone is pleasant and it’s relaxing. It’s not like being in hospital.’ Picture: Domnick Walsh

A former convent in Tralee has been turned in a hub from where nurses and therapists travel out to older people’s homes instead of asking them to come into University Hospital Kerry.

When HSE CEO Bernard Gloster recently pledged he would be “shocked” to see trolley numbers this winter as high as last January, the introduction of these integrated care programme for older persons (ICPOP) hubs is one of the reforms he is leaning on.