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Minister Reilly with Professor John Higgins, Chair of the Strategic Group, at today's press conference

Health Minister James Reilly today announced a reorganisation of public hospitals into more efficient and accountable hospital groups that will deliver improved outcomes for patients.  This represents the most fundamental reform of the Irish acute hospital system in decades.

The Government’s decision regarding the establishment and operation of the new hospital groups was informed by two reports – ‘The Establishment of Hospital Groups as a Transition to Independent Hospital Trusts’, produced by an expert group led by Professor John Higgins following consultation with stakeholders, and ‘The Framework for Development – Securing the Future of Smaller Hospitals’.  Both reports were published today.  These reports fulfil important commitments in Future Health, the strategic framework for reform of the health service which was published last November.

Minister Reilly spoke to MerrionStreet.ie after the announcement. Watch the video below...

By working in groups, hospital services will be provided by the hospitals in each group, based on the evidence based needs of their populations.  Each group of hospitals will work together as single cohesive entities managed as one, to provide acute care for patients in their area, integrating with community and primary care.  This will maximise the amount of care delivered locally, whilst ensuring complex care is safely provided in larger hospitals. Six hospital groups will be established as follows:

• Dublin North East;
• Dublin Midlands;
• Dublin East;
• South/South West;
• West/North West;
• Midwest.  

Each group will comprise between six and eleven hospitals and will include at least one major teaching hospital.  Each grouping will also include a primary academic partner in order to stimulate a culture of learning and openness to change within the hospital group.  Robust governance and management structures will be put in place at group level.  

Benefits for Patients

The objectives of the groups are to:

• achieve the highest standard of quality and uniformity in hospital care across the group;
• deliver cost effective hospital care in a timely and sustainable manner;
• encourage and support clinical and managerial leaders;
• ensure high standards of governance, both clinical and corporate and recruit and retain high quality nurses, NCHDs, consultants, allied health professionals and administrators in all our hospitals.

The introduction of groups will provide for organisational change in the first instance, giving more autonomy and better enabling the reorganisation of services in a well-planned manner.  Over time, this will help to improve services and deliver better outcomes for patients.

Speaking at the launch, Minister Reilly said:

The establishment of hospital groups signals a fundamental modernisation of our health system organisation in line with best international practice.  The new hospital groups, each with their own governance and management, have been designed so as to provide the optimal configuration for hospitals to deliver high-quality, safe patient care which is cost effective and guarantees better outcomes for patients.