Conway-Walsh says the Government created a ‘crisis’ in Mayo hospitals

Mayo Sinn Féin TD Rose Conway-Walsh revealed that cancellations at Mayo University Hospital reached 915 last year, according to new data released to Sinn Féin by the HSE.

Teachta Conway-Walsh said: “The Government is failing to tackle hospital overcrowding, which is leading to record levels of cancellations.”

The figure included the cancellation of over 645 procedures, 211 inpatient surgeries and 270 outpatient consultations.

The TD said the Government’s ‘lack of a plan for overcrowding’ is having a direct impact on waiting lists through cancellations. She also said the Government was ‘shifting the problem from emergency departments to waiting lists, leaving patients waiting longer for access to care’.

“13 years of Varadkar, Harris, and Donnelly have made the health service worse. They have decimated local health services and created a crisis in our hospitals in Mayo.

“Sinn Féin has a plan for the health service to improve access, tackle hospital overcrowding, and reduce lengthy waiting lists. We would deliver 3,000 hospital and community beds to tackle overcrowding and inefficiency; end the recruitment embargo and train more health care professionals to safely staff the health service; and invest in better local health services including GP care and a pharmacy first model,” she added.

Ms Conway-Walsh said her party would ‘fast-track elective centres’ in order to ‘separate unscheduled, emergency care from scheduled surgeries and procedures’. 

She continued: “We would also invest in home support, community step-down beds in places like Belmullet, Ballina and Swinford, and diagnostic capacity so that patients can be discharged home or to a supported care setting when they are ready, and to ensure that patients’ experiences are not delayed by lengthy waiting lists for scans.

“Simon Harris will not fix in ten months the disaster which Fine Gael have created over 13 years. It’s time for a Health Minister who will stand up for people and deliver the change that the health service needs,” she concluded.