IPA report: The Irish Patients' Association (IPA) has called on the Government to make it a requirement of nurse training in the State that graduates provide a number of years' compulsory service here or repay their education costs.
In its review of 2004, the IPA said such compulsory service would be similar to schemes in other emergency services such as the Air Corps.
"It will ensure that tax-payers get some benefit from the investment in training, before the nurses leave the country to work abroad," it said.
Due to a change in the nursing curriculum, there will be no nursing graduates in 2005, which is likely to lead to an additional shortage of nurses in public hospitals - a shortage of at least 1,500 is anticipated.
Responding to the call, the Irish Nurses Organisation's (INO's) general secretary, Liam Doran, said the proposal would result in a rapid reduction in the number of nurses. "There is little likelihood of 18-year-olds signing up for four years' education followed by three years' work. They will move to countries where they will not have an anchor attached to their early lives."
He said the only way to improve the retention crisis in nursing was to improve, in relative terms, nurses' pay and conditions.
In a comment on "hyper-inflation" among health providers, the IPA suggested a formal examination of the impact of increased fees by family doctors, consultants and pharmacists. It questions the sustainability of rising healthcare costs and their impact on the health system and the wider economy.
The IPA said it assisted "thousands" of patients in 2004. Its chairman, Stephen McMahon, said significant numbers had complained of inequitable access to care.
Another issue was poor communications. "If more professionals at all levels could communicate effectively with patients and each other, so much angst could be avoided," he added.
Among the specific issues dealt with by the IPA in 2004 were:
A patient with angina who was left on a trolley in the A&E department of a major hospital for seven hours and who subsequently had a heart attack. "As a result of meeting with senior clinicians, the IPA has received assurances that further patients presenting with similar cardiac conditions will be treated more efficiently," the report said.
Asking the Medical Council to overrule a fitness to practise ruling concerning the professional conduct of a doctor involved in the treatment of a patient with ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome. The council has decided to proceed with a full hearing of the case this year.
Making representations to the Irish Medicines Board on behalf of a patient who had experienced side effects from a prescribed drug. The side effects were listed in the patient information leaflet in the US but not on the information given to patients by the pharmaceutical company here.