A leading cardiac surgeon has claimed there have been attempts to discredit his unit at a time when the Minister for Health is deciding where to locate additional cardiac resources.
Mr Maurice Neligan, a cardiothoracic surgeon at the Mater Hospital in Dublin, was responding to an article in Magill. It said that since the beginning of 1996, 14 hearts offered to the National Cardiac Transplant Unit at the Mater Hospital had been refused, either because no staff were available to conduct transplants or because there was a shortage of beds.
"I find the timing of this story very interesting, just before the Minister makes his decision about where the 500 extra cardiac procedures such as by-passes a year are going to be carried out. I believe it was an attempt to discredit the unit. It has been alleged that the problem is one of management, but this is disgraceful. For 10 years we have been trying to get adequate funding and have repeatedly approached ministers for health."
Mr Neligan said more than 100 people had died while awaiting cardiac surgery in the past five years. There were nearly 1,700 people on waiting lists. He defended the decision to close the transplant unit for three days last March to allow staff to attend the a.g.m. of the CardioThoracic Surgeons of Great Britain and Ireland in Dublin. The unit's two theatres were closed for rewiring and the upgrading of equipment.
"We decided we would do it all at the time of the conference. It was then, and still is, a good management decision. We have since discovered that of the three hearts offered for transplant two were turned down in England because the hearts were unsuitable."
Ms Ursula Halligan, the reporter who wrote the article, rejected Mr Neligan's assertions. She told The Irish Times it had "simply been a good story" that was well worth following up.
"Why would I be bothered with timing? Why did they close the unit for three days in March? It was to do with a decision taken to allow staff attend a conference, nothing to do with a lack of funding. If they had not been off-call, suitable Irish donors could have been found for those hearts. This is the designated national centre. Irish people are the best in the world for donating, yet hearts are being turned away," she said.
A review by the Department of Health began in June on the location of a new cardiac unit.