The Mater Hospital in is in negotiations to buy a 50-bed convalescent home in north Dublin to accommodate patients who no longer require full-time acute care.
A spokesman for the Mater told The Irish Times last night that negotiations were at an advanced stage for the purchase of Beaumont Convalescent Home. He said that if the purchase went ahead, the new 50-bed facility would be used as an annex to the public hospital.
The new facility would be used to ease pressure on the hospital's accident and emergency unit. The Mater has been at the centre of controversy in recent months as a result of overcrowding in its accident and emergency unit.
Families of patients who had to wait for prolonged periods - sometimes several days - on trolleys in the A&E department have demonstrated at the hospital and held protest marches to the Dáil.
The hospital has said that it regretted the overcrowding but that it simply did not have enough beds.
It also blamed the pressure in the A&E unit on a large number of beds in the Mater being inappropriately occupied by patients who no longer required acute care.
The purchase of the convalescent home in Beaumont would be used as an interim step-down facility for some of these patients.
The spokesman said that the convalescent home would be used for patients on an interim basis until longer-term accommodation could be provided elsewhere.
He said that the purchase of the home would, in effect, provide the hospital with the equivalent of 50 additional acute beds.
It is understood that there are currently around 68 patients at the Mater Hospital who no longer required acute care.
Informed sources said that the number of such "bed blocker" patients had remained stubbornly high at the Mater in recent months with numbers running between 50 and 70 at any one time.
The Mater authorities have told the Department of Health that it requires around 100 additional beds to cope with demand.
The Irish Times understands that the Department has told the hospital that it can begin planning for additional beds which would be provided as part of massive redevelopment of the Mater complex which is currently being planned.
This will see the development of a new hospital for children on the site (which will replace Temple Street). The overall project, at over €400 million, will be the most expensive healthcare project in the history of the State.
However, the new developments including the additional beds at the Mater, will not be completed for another four years.
The Mater Hospital authorities have told the Department of Health that it was in a unique position "in that it is the only truly inner-city hospital from a general accident and emergency perspective, and that the age-profile in our catchment area, together with the socio-economic conditions that prevail , and other factors seem to have a particular impact on our situation."
All acute beds in the hospital are currently open. Beds that were closed down last year for financial reasons have been reopened.
