Irish Examiner View: Surgery delays for children with spinal issues simply not good enough

This is yet another kick in the teeth from a health system many families widely regard as having failed them. 

A “temporary pause” has been imposed on scoliosis operations for children which were scheduled to take place over the next three weeks at Temple Street Hospital in Dublin. Picture: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie

At this moment, there are 32 children with scoliosis awaiting surgery at Temple Street Children’s Hospital in Dublin. 

In the next three weeks a number of those children were anticipating vital, yet complex, spinal surgery. Those operations have been cancelled for three weeks, creating grave anxiety among those awaiting the procedures and their parents.

The three-week cancellation might not seem like much to anyone outside the bubble of this ongoing problem, but for those desperate for surgery — and their loved ones — this is yet another kick in the teeth from a health system they widely regard as having failed them. 

Young patients and their guardians, long suffering and in desperate need of relief from constant pain — or worse, having to watch a small child in permanent, unrelieved agony — feel betrayed by this latest delay.

Everyone understands the highly complex nature of surgeries on patients with scoliosis, hydrocephalus, and spina bifida takes expertise, time, and an awful lot of post-operation treatment. It necessitates the development and building of specialist teams of doctors, nurses, and support staff.

Children’s Health Ireland, which is responsible for delivering this vital care, says the cumulative effect of taking on such complex surgeries has put pressure on beds, theatre capacity, and specialist staff. Frankly, this is not good enough.

The organisation’s position that the cancellation of surgeries was a “temporary pause” and it would deliver on its promise that by the end of the year no patient would be waiting more than four months for treatment, rings hollow. 

Many patients have already been waiting for too long for treatment and, it seems to them and their loved ones, their pain and discomfort is acceptable to those in charge.

For so long now it has been widely accepted that Children’s Health Ireland staff have been under-resourced, leading to the backlogs which forced this “pause”.

Ireland may have many problems that need to be addressed urgently, but surely there is no greater problem than children living in unnecessary, constant, and debilitating pain.