Save Our St Joseph’s Hospital group assured services will be returning to the area

The Health Service Executive representatives from Save Our St Joseph’s Hospital to ensure that HIQA (Health Information and Quality Authority) requirements are met.

The HSE reiterated that following an inspection undertaken by HIQA, essential fire upgrade works were identified that needed to be completed within a specified timeframe to ensure that HIQA requirements are met and St Joseph’s Hospital remains fully operational.  

To complete these works there was a requirement for patients to be relocated within the hospital and the most suitable area identified was the Primary Care Physiotherapy Department, formerly known as Drogheda Ward.

This ensures that existing patients in the hospital are catered for and will not be disturbed by the work.  In addition, it ensures that bed numbers can be retained to facilitate short-stay admissions from the acute sector and to ensure that the continuity of hospital discharges and patient flow from Letterkenny University Hospital are maintained.

Going forward, the  inpatient Primary Care  Physiotherapy Service will continue to be provided 

to the residents of the St Joseph’s Hospital at the bedside as historically has been the practice. 

The Physiotherapy  Department also provided an outpatient service to the community. Because of the urgent need for clinically safe accommodation required to deliver this service Outpatient Primary Care Physiotherapy  Service has temporarily had to relocate to the Donegal Town Community Hospital and to Lifford Community Hospital Outpatients area.

The services have communicated with affected service users advising on which centre to attend for an appointment and notified all other stakeholders of the relocation.  The HSE would like to apologise for any inconvenience caused as a result of these upgrade works.

The HSE wish to confirm that as part of its overall service delivery plan and in the best interests for service users in the longer term, Primary Care Services including Physiotherapy Services will be provided from the Finn Valley area in accordance with the patient’s needs.

Therefore, work is ongoing to secure suitable appropriate accommodation in the Finn Valley area to enable Outpatient Primary Care Physiotherapy Services to be restored to the local area as soon as possible. The HSE is looking at a plan to locate all Primary Care Services in one building i.e. Physiotherapy, Podiatry, Dentistry, and Occupational Therapy. This accommodation will enable Primary Care to deliver the additional services under the Enhanced Community Care Programme (Slaintecare), and will support the staff in the East Network Primary Care Team, enabling this team to work in a cohesive and integrated way with their colleagues.

The HSE is committed to provisions of excellent services for older persons in Finn Valley area.  As part of their plan they are working to ensure that residential, dementia and respite care beds are available through the continued refurbishment of St Joseph’s Hospital. Thereby ensuring it meets HIQA requirements.  St Josephs also has a vital role in providing step-down beds for Letterkenny University Hospital. The HSE wish to ensure St Joseph’s remains as a flagship community Hospital. The HSE will continue to liaise with all relevant stakeholders.

A delegation from the committee at Save Our St Joseph’s Hospital were delighted to meet with some representatives. The HSE were provided with questions the committee wanted answered, prior to their meeting. They were answered by the HSE in what the committee called “an open, honest and reaffirming meeting.”

It was promised at the joint meeting that communication lines would remain open between both the HSE and Save Our St Joseph’s Hospital Action Group.

The Action Group will continue to meet regularly and interested members of the community are welcome to attend their meetings.

“We would like to extend our thanks to all who are supporting our campaign through the Action Group committee and we look forward to meeting again soon,” they said.