CUH gynaecology service crisis - Patients at risk by failure to face reality

The chronic underfunding of the gynaecology service at Cork University Hospital is both disturbing and alarming.

Disturbing because it reveals a crisis in confidence among consultants in the governance of the hospital and, as a consequence, they have risen in open revolt to force change which they deem essential to the welfare of women in their care.

While other large maternity hospitals in the country have a dedicated management and budget, the Cork University Maternity Hospital does not and operates under a single governance framework for CUH and CUMH.

According to Tony McNamara, chief executive of the CUH, that governance model is working “extremely well”. But it clearly isn’t, according to a group of hospital consultants who are angered that their long-standing concerns about the restriction and curtailment of the maternity services and the failure to ring-fence the budget allocated to CUMH are not being addressed.

Up until 2007, Cork had three maternity hospitals, each with its own dedicated budget and governance. The amalgamation of those services into one maternity hospital was heralded as a huge advance offering much improved services. However, in the process, CUMH lost budgetary control and the result is that, not only have services not improved, but they have become worse.

It is alarming because this isn’t all about budgets; it’s about thousands of women whose lives and well-being are being put at unnecessary risk. CUMH serves a catchment area of more than half a million yet, almost ten years after it was opened, it is still only working at less than half its capacity.

That is not only a huge waste of resources but a lost opportunity. CUMH is housed in a beautiful building, sparkling with modernity. It has the capacity to be a world leader in its field. Instead, it is a fiasco and that cannot and should not be allowed to continue.

As our report today reveals, the waiting lists at CUMH are shocking. In January this year, 3,512 women were awaiting outpatient appointments for gynaecology services. Now the figure is more than 4,000 — and still climbing. The result of this could hardly be more serious, as it poses a risk of delayed diagnosis of cancers in women who are forced to wait for years for their outpatient assessment.

It is no wonder that the consultants have lost their patience with senior management at the hospital and it is no wonder they are no longer prepared to stand over the current regime.

They have alerted Mr McNamara, who is CEO of both the CUH and the CUMH, to the crisis, so it is something of which he is acutely aware. How, then, can he say that the current governance model is working well?

How can he assert — as he did — that a study had shown the quality of service offered by CUMH was “superior” to that of the three Dublin hospitals when so many consultants say it is in crisis?

For the sake of the hospital and, more importantly, for the sake of CUMH patients, he must answer those questions and face the situation as it is and not as he might like it to be.