The Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) has published its terms of reference for an independent statutory review in respect of the delivery of safe quality urgent and emergency care in the mid-west region of Ireland. Health Minister Stephen Donnelly called for the review earlier this year in response to ongoing overcrowding at the Emergency Department(ED) in University Hospital Limerick.
As part of this review, HIQA was requested to consider the case for a second emergency department within the region in the context of the population changes in recent years and ongoing pressures at the ED at UHL.
HIQA was also requested to consider the recommendations of a HSE-commissioned review by former Chief Justice Frank Clarke into the circumstances surrounding the death of Aoife Johnston from sepsis in the ED at UHL in December 2022 in conducting this review.
Since hospital services were reconfigured in 2009 there is only one ED serving the populations of Clare, Limerick and North Tipperary. UHL has routinely experienced the second highest number of presentations to the ED per annum compared to other hospitals, while also having the second lowest number of inpatient beds of the Model Four hospitals in the State.
HIQA hopes that the findings and recommendations of the review will be presented to Minister Donnelly by Summer 2025 with an interim report to be delivered in 6 months
