Simon Harris, Minister for Health, visits to open newly extended ED (Emergency Department)
Simon Harris, Minister for Health, visits Temple Street Children’s University Hospital where 126,000 children were cared for in 2015, to open newly extended ED (Emergency Department).
Simon Harris, Minister for Health will visit Temple Street today to officially open the newly extended and refurbished ED (Emergency Department) and to launch the hospital’s 2015 Annual Report. The extension and refurbishment of the ED in Temple Street commenced in February 2015 and has resulted in the provision of a second two-bay RATU (Rapid Assessment and Treatment Unit), two additional single treatment rooms and a new reception and waiting area. The cost of the ED extension and refurbishment including equipment was €690k and funding came from the HSE.. The second RATU was furnished with the assistance of a generous donation from Danielle Ryan and the Cathal Ryan Trust secured by the Temple Street Foundation.
Overall non-clinic ED attendances in 2015 numbered 49,420, of which 5,667 patients were treated in the first (original) RATU. To date RATU has been staffed by a combination of a Consultant in Paediatric Emergency Medicine, an ANP (Advanced Nurse Practitioner), a NCHD (Non Consultant Hospital Doctor), and a CNM (Clinical Nurse Manager.
Speaking about the opening of the second RATU, Dr Roisin McNamara, Consultant Emergency Medicine Physician, Temple Street said “The new RATU does not come with additional staff but will allow us to stream patients more efficiently and the extra space will give an overall better patient experience with less congestion in the waiting area. In winter finding a bed to examine a patient when the majority of beds are occupied by admitted patients can be difficult so the addition of four extra beds to the ED will help with this. We also now have four isolation rooms, which will allow us to isolate patients in specific rooms without affecting the normal functioning of the ED and will provide a more comfortable environment for overnight patients. Finally the new reception and waiting area following the ED refurbishment are brighter, more open and allow better visualization by staff of patients and families waiting.”
Temple Street’s 2015 Annual Report (https://www.cuh.ie/news-communications/hospital-publications/) shows that 19,750 children were cared for as in-patients, there were 53,591 attendances to Consultant lead clinics in the OPD (Outpatients Department) and as above there were 53,042 attendances to the hospital’s ED (Emergency Department).
Speaking about the launch of the 2015 Annual Report, Mona Baker, CEO, Temple Street said “2015 was a year of growing activity in the hospital when we cared for over 126,000 children and as a national hospital, which offers a number of different specialities including neurology, neurosurgery, nephrology (including haemodyalsis and kidney transplantation), orthopaedics, plastics surgery and metabolics, children come to Temple Street from all over Ireland. In 2015 the biggest attendance rates were by children from North and South County Dublin which numbered over 97,000 but on a combined basis, we looked after nearly 19,000 children from counties Cork, Galway Cavan, Monaghan and Wexford amongst all other counties”
A sample of other data and activity from the 2015 Annual Report also showed that;
- 6,305 children had surgery in Temple Street’s OT (Operating Theatre) Department in 2015
- 1,672 were admitted under the care of the nephrology speciality in 2015 including five children who had kidney transplants
- 1,812 children were admitted under the care of the orthopaedic speciality in 2015 and 10,789 attended the orthopaedics outpatients clinics
- 686 children were admitted under the care of the neurosurgery speciality in 2015
- 3,106 children came from Wicklow, 1,276 children from Cork City and County, 1,469 from Galway City and County, 11,261 from Monaghan and 1,782 from Cavan to attend Temple Street during 2015.
- The Medical Social Work Department received 1,490 new referrals and 607 child protection referrals
- The Chaplaincy Department, in partnership with the Medical Social Work provided a bereavement service to 52 families
- The Occupational Therapy Department provided 3,362 appointments to 571 children
- Compliance with antimicrobial guidelines improved from 30% to 100% consistently and hospital expenditure was reduced by €106,000 on this group of medications in one year
- The national Hand Hygiene audit showed that Temple Street achieved 92% compliance by October 2015 when the national target was 90%
For further information, please contact Jane Curtin, Temple Street. Tel.: 087 938 0779