Health spending: The Minister for Health Mr Martin has been sharply criticised for completely excluding services in the North Eastern Health Board region from his recent round of funding announcements.
The criticism has come from a number of doctors, including the medical adviser to the North Eastern Health Board (NEHB), Mr Finbarr Lennon.
Mr Lennon, a surgeon at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda, told a meeting of GPs in Cavan he was "dismayed and disappointed" at the fact that not a penny of the recent €85 million allocated to open idle healthcare facilities across the State went to the north east region.
Funding went to every other health board region in the State except the NEHB, to allow them open more than 200 additional beds.
The north east was excluded despite the fact that there have been well-publicised problems at hospitals in the region, particularly at Cavan General Hospital where the medical board has been stressing the need for funding for extra beds.
Dr Alan Finan, secretary of the hospital's medical board said yesterday: "Equally we are disappointed."
He said a steering group established in April by the chief executive of the NEHB Mr Paul Robinson to draw up plans for the development of joint clinical departments between Cavan and Monaghan Hospitals had recently completed its work and its recommendations had "not insignificant" resource implications.
Its recommendations, he added, were sent to the Department in the week before the €85 million was announced and they again emphasised the need for funding for more beds at Cavan hospital.
Dr Finan said he accepted the decision on where the €85 million should be spent may have been made before the steering group's report arrived in the Department but he hoped the Department hadn't "emptied its coffers" because "unless more resources are provided problems will recur" in Cavan hospital.
"There is no way the situation here will be sorted out without more money," he said.
The hospital has been at the centre of controversy since two of its surgeons were suspended over a year ago due to interpersonal difficulties. In the four months after their suspension there were 15 adverse clinical incidents at the hospital's surgery unit and in February nine-year-old Frances Sheridan died three weeks after an appendix operation at the hospital. A post mortem found she died from complications of recent surgery.
Dr Illona Duffy, a GP in Monaghan, said she was disappointed but not surprised the NEHB had been excluded from recent funding allocations. "The NEHB is already the most underfunded health board in the country," she said.
Meanwhile it is not yet clear if the steering group which has now planned joint clinical departments between Cavan and Monaghan hospitals has, in line with Mr Robinson's directive, decided that only day surgery should be carried out at Monaghan Hospital. Mr Lennon, in his meeting with GPs, expressed support for the directive and said it was necessary to implement it immediately.
Dr Duffy said she could not support any reduction in surgical services at Monaghan hospital as it would affect patient care.
A spokesman for the NEHB said the steering group's report would be published shortly.
The Department of Health said it was continuing to support a range of service developments in the north east region.