Rumblings over Community Hospitals

In mid January, newspaper reports began to emerge of problems with many nursing homes across the country, especially in light of upcoming new stricter regulations from HIQA. It became a national political event for a few days, but unfortunately St.Joseph’s Community Hospital Millstreet was one of six in Cork that were mentioned.

Local FG TD Michael Creed dismissed suggestions that the local hospitals faced closure, but FF leader Mícheál Martin insisted that a huge crisis was looming due to new stricter HIQA requirements that are coming in July 2015.

At a local meeting, FG TD Áine Collins suggested that a private modern hospital should be built to replace St. Josephs, and that the community should get behind it.

Locally people have put a lot of time and money to upgrade and maintain our local hospital, because God forbid we can’d afford to lose another service in our community. It’s hard to know what will happen, only time will tell, but it can’t be stressed enough that these services should remain local.

The latest inspection reports a “warm environment … residents voiced how happy they were with the care they received … how residents enjoyed the food of offer … Staff exhibited an in-depth knowledgeable about the residents and their backgrounds and were observed caring for residents in a respectful manner while respecting the residents’ privacy and dignity”, but there are some major non-compliance issues are around the design of the building, primarily that there is no single room(s) for end of life care.

Links

HSE moves to allay fears of nursing home closures – Major non-compliance at 20+ public nursing homes across the country leads to fear of closure (Irish Examiner 19th Jan)

Creed Moves to Allay Fears over local Hospitals – The article in yesterday’s paper was sensationalised and unhelpful in that it raises fears for residents and staff of the facilities mentioned. The truth of the matter is that closure of these facilities is certainly not on the agenda (19th Jan)

Micheál Martin warns of crisis if care homes not upgraded – A crisis in State-run care homes is looming due to lack of funding for upgrades, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin has warned. A failure of government investment has led to alarm that 21 of the biggest such residences may not pass stringent new HIQA standards, set to come into force in July, Mr Martin told the Dáil.

St. Joseph’s Hospital Millstreet – full details on our local nursing home from IrishNursingHomes.ieNursing Home Inspection Reports for St.Joseph’s Hospital Millstreet  (latest report from Aug 12th 2014)

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Lisa has written a lovely piece on the memories she had growing up in the vicinity of the hospital. We should all treasure memories like these of our youth: See it here.