NURSES AT Killarney Community Hospital staged a further one-hour stoppage yesterday amid growing concerns about the future of the 39-bed hospital and medical services in Kerry.
Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) representative Michael Dineen said there had been no consultation with the 25 hospital nurses on the announcement in April that the hospital was to be amalgamated with an elderly care home. Nurses were also concerned at the non-replacement of a matron or director of nursing specifically for the community hospital.
“It’s regrettable that we still have to be doing this. We are quite prepared to enter into negotiations, but there has been no movement by the HSE. It comes back to accountability by the HSE, and the way they implement decisions taken without consultation,” Mr Dineen said.
A number of public protests and work stoppages have taken place over the past month amid growing fear for the future of the hospital despite reassurances by the HSE about its future.
There is also concern about acute services at Kerry General Hospital after a report on services in Cork and Kerry leaked to a newspaper detailed how acute services were to be concentrated at Cork University Hospital.
The HSE has denied it plans to downgrade Kerry General Hospital. However, local representatives remain suspicious.
In addition, a planned primary care centre by GPs looks unlikely to go ahead after the GPs failed to tender for health board land. The GPs say this was because they failed to get permission for a pharmacy in the centre from the town council.
However, the doctors’ consortium did not pursue the matter with An Bord Pleanála.