New children's hospital (Dublin)

Unnamed children's hospital
National Paediatric Hospital Development Board
Geography
Location Dublin, Ireland
Organisation
Hospital type Teaching
Services
Speciality Children's hospital
Links
Website www.newchildrenshospital.ie
Lists Hospitals in the Republic of Ireland

An unnamed new children's hospital is to be constructed on the campus of St James's Hospital in Dublin, Ireland, as a regional secondary and national tertiary centre. It will combine the services currently provided at Dublin's three children's hospitals: Our Lady's Children's Hospital, Crumlin; Children's University Hospital, Temple Street; and the National Children's Hospital at Tallaght Hospital.[1] In addition to the main hospital at St James's, satellite centres will operate attached to Tallaght Hospital and Connolly Hospital providing local paediatric urgent care and outpatient services.

History

The consolidation of Ireland's tertiary paediatric care into a single centre was first proposed in 1993 by the Faculty of Paediatrics oat the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland.[1] In 2005, the Irish government commissioned McKinsey & Company to undertake a review of children's health services.[1] This resulted in 2006's Children's Health First report, which recommended that, in view of Ireland's size and expected demand, there should be a single tertiary paediatric centre based in Dublin, with good transport and access links, room for future expansion, ideally colocated with a leading tertiary adult centre, and "at the nexus of an integrated paediatric service" with urgent care centres around Dublin and with regional children's hospitals around the country.[2] The report proposed nine assessment criteria for making a decision on the best location and model.[2]

2006–2012: the Mater site

Later in 2006, a Health Service Executive taskforce selected the Mater Misericordiae University Hospital in north central Dublin as the location of the future hospital.[1] The selection process was criticised by both the National Children's Hospital and by Our Lady's Children's Hospital, as well as patient interest groups and one of the paediatricians who contributed to the McKinsey report.[3] In 2007 the Minister for Health, Mary Harney, established a National Paediatric Hospital Development Board (NPHDB) to oversee the project.[1] The chairman of the board, Philip Lynch, resigned unexpectedly in October 2010 citing "significant and fundamental differences" with Harney over the chosen location of the hospital, as well as over funding arrangements and governance.[4] Lynch had met with the property developer Noel Smyth and with staff from Our Lady's Children's Hospital and had come to favour an alternative plan, whereby the hospital would be built on greenfield land owned by Smyth in Newlands Cross outside central Dublin.[5] Harney announced that she had requested Lynch's resignation, stating that "it is not in the remit of the Development Board to revisit the Government decision taken on the location of the new hospital".[4] Lynch was replaced as chairman of the NPHDB by the businessman John Gallagher, who himself resigned only months later in March 2011, saying that he "no longer feels that he has the mandate to continue with his original remit to build the hospital at the Mater site", since the new Minister for Health, James Reilly, had publicly considered reviewing the decision to locate the new hospital there.[6]

Reilly went on to assemble an independent group of international experts to review the process; it concluded in July 2011 that the Mater site remained the best of the available options,[7] and the NPHDB formally applied for planning permission on 20 July, naming the project as the "Children's Hospital of Ireland".[8] The application was contested and went through an appeals process. In February 2012, An Bord Pleanála announced that it had refused permission for the project, stating in its decision that "by reason of its height, scale, form and mass, located on this elevated site, [the hospital] would result in a dominant, visually incongruous structure and would have a profound negative impact on the appearance and visual amenity of the city skyline," as well as constituting overdevelopment of the Mater campus and detracting from the historic character of the surrounding area.[8]

2012–present: the St James's site

In the wake of the refusal of planning permission, Reilly tasked another review group (led by the businessman Frank Dolphin) to determine other options for the new hospital.[9] The report proposed nine assessment criteria for making a decision on the best location and model.[2] Prioritising colocation with an existing adult teaching hospital – and, ideally, "trilocation" with a maternity hospital as well – the group sought submissions from six adult hospitals within Dublin.[9] It received proposals from the Mater (revised from the previous project that had been rejected), Beaumont Hospital, St James's Hospital, Tallaght Hospital, and Connolly Hospital, as well as a proposal from the Coombe Women & Infants University Hospital that was backed by St James's.[9] St Vincent's University Hospital declined to participate.[9] The group also received, but chose to exclude, a number of unsolicited site offers that were not linked to a Dublin teaching hospital.[9] The report, published in June 2012, did not rank options but rather listed strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats associated with each proposal, with the final decision being left to the government.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Flaherty, Rachel; D'Arcy, Ciarán (28 April 2016). "The national children's hospital: A timeline". The Irish Times. Dublin. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 McKinsey & Company (2006). Children's Health First (Report). McKinsey & Company. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  3. ↑ "Experts never suggested Mater as site for hospital". Irish Independent. 17 January 2007. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  4. 1 2 Connors, Aoife (22 October 2010). "Controversy lingers over hospital project". Irish Medical Times. Dublin. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  5. ↑ McCarthy, Justine (17 October 2010). "Children's hospital chief 'split board' over consortium talks". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 12 June 2016. (subscription required (help)).
  6. ↑ Donnellan, Eithne (30 March 2011). "Second chairman resigns from board of children's hospital". Irish Times. Dublin. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  7. ↑ "National Children's Hospital to go to planning on Mater site following Independent Review". Department of Health. 6 July 2011. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  8. 1 2 "An Bord Pleanála Reference Number 29N.PA0024 - Planning Decision" (PDF). An Bord Pleanála. 23 February 2012. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 Review Group on the National Children’s Hospital (7 June 2012). Report of the Review Group on the National Children's Hospital (PDF) (Report). Department of Health. Retrieved 12 June 2016.
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