A shortage of specialist nurses is holding up the start of open heart surgery at the new cardiac surgery unit at University College Hospital Galway.
It was initially planned that the first cardiac patient would be operated on at the new facility at the end of January. Six weeks later, however, all of the necessary staff are still not in place.
A spokeswoman for the HSE West said: "The hospital has already recruited a complement of highly trained staff, indeed all but a small number of the necessary staff are in place. It is also important to state that there is an acknowledged international shortage of specialist cardio-thoracic nurses. UCHG has been engaged in ongoing international recruitment campaigns in an effort to fill the posts at the hospital."
The spokeswoman stressed that UCHG was committed to the provision of a full cardio-thoracic surgical service at the hospital, the first specialist unit for complex cardio-thoracic surgery outside Dublin and Cork.
The HSE West has pointed out that there are currently two consultant cardio-thoracic surgeons in place at the new unit, the first of whom joined the hospital five months ago and the second two months ago.
The perfusion engineer began his work three weeks ago and is currently involved in commissioning the equipment required to carry out cardio-thoracic surgery.
"The plan is to introduce this service on a phased basis, and a number of major thoracic procedures have already taken place," said the HSE spokeswoman.
The hospital has strongly rejected claims made this week by Fine Gael's Cllr Fidelma Healy Eames in relation to the development of cardio-thoracic surgery at UCHG.
The Galway county councillor highlighted the fact that cardiac surgery could not proceed at UCHG due to the shortage of cardiac nurses.
"Millions of euro are frozen as a result of the shortage of cardiac nurses, millions spent on equipment, theatres and indeed wages of consultant surgeons and specialists hired specifically for this role.
"Someone must be held accountable for this inadequate forward planning and appalling wastage of time and money," she stated.
Cllr Healy Eames said this situation has been known for some time so the fault had to lie either with hospital management, the Department of Health or the Minister for Health for not ensuring that enough cardiac nurses were in place.
The councillor said a complement of eight nurses was needed to staff the unit, but there were only two available. Meanwhile, more than 50 patients awaited bypass surgery in the Galway area.
"I am calling on the management at UCHG to identify where the hold-up with the provision of cardiac nurses lies for UCHG. There is so much frustration with and lack of confidence in the health service, it is time the public knew exactly what is going on," Cllr Healy Eames stated.
Up to 350 open heart cases a year will be treated at the cardiac surgery unit at UCHG when it is up and running along with some 150 thoracic cases. As well as two operating theatres equipped to the highest standards available anywhere in the world, the new unit comprises six ICU beds, four high dependency unit beds and 10 ward beds for pre-operative and recovering patients.
