It is merely deeply irritating that one cannot begin to discuss the health service without genuflecting to our fantastic health workers first. What kind of a service is it that demands such extraordinary levels of silence and hyperbole from its…
Novus Medica
Medical news service from Penhire
Blog Archives
HSE to learn how to cut costs at boot camp
HSE managers are to be sent on boot-camp training in the latest attempt to curb overspending in the health service. The training is included in a €125,000 contract the Health Service Executive has signed with a US consultancy firm. Chicago-based…
Hospital spent €1.8m on deals that broke transparency rules, says review
The independent review into Tallaght Hospital’s finances shows the facility spent €1.8m in 2010 without undergoing clearly stated vetting procedures. (Examiner) >
Changes demanded of consultants make no sense
In my hospital, the absentee rate for medics is 0.4 per cent compared to up to 5 per cent in general in the health service; in other words doctors go to work day and night and at weekends, even when…
Hospital governance plans are potentially dangerous
Henry Murdoch, chairman of the National Rehabilitation Hospital, Dún Laoghaire: “The Minister should move carefully in this area and not create more obfuscation by introducing “line management” by “shadow chairpersons” and “shadow chief executives”.” (Times) >
No accountability structure for clinicians in Mid-West acute hospital network
The HSE has admitted staff morale is low and that there is no accountability structure for clinicians within its acute hospital network in the Mid-West. The admissions appear in a HSE document proposing the overhaul of management structures in the…
Tagged with: Management
Posted in Croom, Ennis, Gerry Burke (Obstetrician), HSE, Midwest, Nenagh, St John's
Posted in Croom, Ennis, Gerry Burke (Obstetrician), HSE, Midwest, Nenagh, St John's
Health cuts will kill babies, Labour chief tells ministers
Concern will be heightened this weekend by the intervention of Dr Gerry Burke, a consultant obstetrician, who has said that proposed a new hospital management system in the mid-west region “amounts to rampant managerialism”. The region already has the highest…
Reilly defends use of outside experts
A spokesman for Dr Reilly said the consultants would provide expertise to the department’s special delivery unit (SDU) which is working to reduce waiting lists. In April it was confirmed that Lis Nixon had been brought in as a consultant.…
Mater hospital makes top-up payments to two executives
The hospital said last night chief executive Brian Conlan was paid an additional sum of €25,625 per year which was related to executive oversight for the development of the new €284 million facility at the Mater hospital. (Times) >
Irish Times editorial: When hospitals fail patients
In Hiqa and the department’s Special Delivery Unit, we have professionals who are committed to changing the negative culture surrounding health and systemic shortcomings. They and the Minister for Health James Reilly must be supported by Government in ensuring an…
Top-up payments revealed at hospital
A NUMBER of senior managers at the country’s largest hospital, St James’s, receive extra earnings on top of their State-funded salaries, it has emerged. The hospital confirmed the extra payments for the first time yesterday, indicating that the practice is…
Tallaght Hospital faces two reviews
Two separate reviews into why Tallaght Hospital spent millions of euro on non-tendered external consultancy work and ‘top-up’ payments for high-ranking staff are under way. (Examiner) >
Hospital signs up €340,000 advisers to boost efficiency
The Irish Independent has learnt that Tallaght hospital has hired DMGM Ltd on a two-year contract for €340,000 to help boost efficiency. (Indo) >
Ex-Tallaght Hospital chair ‘disappointed’ at criticisms
Alan Gillis, a former Fine Gael MEP who served on Tallaght’s board for 10 years, said the report was “harsh” and failed to take into account the difficulties facing management. (Irish Independent) >
Tallaght ignored the rules to hire €1.8m consultants
Responding to the report yesterday, Tallaght Hospital chief executive Eilish Hardiman, who took over in August last year, said four of the five executives were no longer employed by the hospital. “By way of explanation, the new interim board was made aware…
Chairman of interim Tallaght hospital board cites ‘failure of leadership’
At a press conference yesterday following the publication by the Health Information and Quality Authority of a report following its investigation into the hospital, Sir Keith Pearson said people would not want to be accommodated on a trolley in a…
Cancer care designed around patients
Soon, McMillan and the University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust will open the UK’s most advanced cancer hospital, following an investment by the charity of £10 million in cash and 100 years worth of experience. The North London hospital…
Merge hospitals into new administrative groups
The HSE has been ordered to merge hospitals into new administrative groups with a single budget and a staff ceiling as part of plans to cut costs, high-level administration, and patient waiting times. Since January, University Hospital Galway, Merlin Park…
Tagged with: Management, Reconfiguration
Posted in Galway, Hospitals/Clinics, Merlin Park, Portiuncula, Roscommon
Posted in Galway, Hospitals/Clinics, Merlin Park, Portiuncula, Roscommon
Five times as many nurses retired as manager staff
MORE THAN five times as many nurses as management and administration personnel left the health service before controversial changes to pension arrangements came into effect at the beginning of the month. (Times) >
Hospital chief takes up post at ‘critical time’
One of the HSE South’s most senior backroom officials has been appointed the new chief executive of the Mercy University Hospital. Sandra Daly, who was previously the service’s general manager for the Cork area office, begins her role at the…
St Vincent’s and Mater to merge
The Mater and St Vincent’s University Hospital, have agreed to come together under a joint governance structure from January 2013. The new structure will facilitate rapid and effective transfer of research ideas into clinical practice across the two hospital sites.…
Tagged with: Management
Posted in Beaumont, Connolly, Hospitals/Clinics, Mater Dublin, Research, St Vincents
Posted in Beaumont, Connolly, Hospitals/Clinics, Mater Dublin, Research, St Vincents
Ex-NHS expert gets Tallaght post
Sir Keith Pearson has been nominated by Church of Ireland Archbishop Michael Jackson of Dublin to the board of the hospital. The Department of Health said yesterday that, subject to election by the board, Sir Keith will be the new…
State’s hospitals owed €270m in outstanding debt
“The HSE is preparing to carry out a pilot study in two acute hospitals – Waterford Regional and Cork University – to identify improvements in the existing process that can be rolled out to all hospitals. Possible options include the…
Hospitals could earn €120m from better management
PUBLIC HOSPITALS could generate an additional €120 million in revenue from health insurance companies if they were more efficient in how they managed their stock of beds for fee-paying patients. Briefing papers drawn up by the Department of Health maintain…
A sad day that I am compelled to seek medical care outside of the State
[Letter to Indo >] I decide to cross the border and head to Daisy Hill. I am greeted (yes, actually greeted) by a receptionist who calmly takes my details. She tells me that I will have to pay £84 but…
Has the health service gone mad?
(Letter to Times) > Sir, – When a renowned neurologist with an international reputation agrees that the Irish health service is mad “and it is getting madder”, those who are not should worry. Dr Norman Delanty’s comment (November 10th) raises…
Radical reforms for Tallaght hospital
THE BOARD of Tallaght hospital in Dublin is to be slimmed down and its existing charter replaced by way of legislation as part of major changes to its governance arrangements. “The unique history of Tallaght hospital, combining as it does [in…
Machiavellian reflections on life at the helm of the HSE
Patients and the public interest were at the heart of Prof Brendan Drumm’s five years as chief executive of the HSE, but his tenure was coloured by frustration and ’groupthink’, writes MUIRIS HOUSTON “A board member operating in the public interest…
HSE was Trojan horse for government, claims Drumm
Professor Drumm, whose new book ‘The Challenge of Change’ is about his five-year tenure at the helm of the HSE, said cabinets were under pressure to slow down changes such as the reorganisation of hospitals, which led to the closure…
Meeting today on plan for changes at Tallaght hospital
In a statement last night, the hospital said the changes recommended by the board were being considered by the three constituent foundations of the hospital which came together at the Tallaght site in 1998 – the former Adelaide, Meath and…
