A €25-million private healthcare facility is to be built in Naas, Co Kildare, it was announced today.
The day-care centre is due to open on July 1st 2008 on a 1.5-acre site just 200 metres from Naas General Hospital.
Vista Primary Care will operate the facility which it hopes will attract patients from counties Kildare, Carlow, Laois, Wicklow.
Shareholders in the company are aviation entrepreneurs Desmond and Ulick McEvaddy and Swanview director Gerald Roche.
Ulick McEvaddy
The primary care centre will initially employ 36 consultants, medical specialists, general practitioners and complementary nursing and administrators.
"As the population expands, primary care facilities, such as planned by Vista Primary Care will be an essential element of Ireland's medical services mix," said Ulick McEvaddy.
"One of the key benefits of this facility is that it will save many people in the region the inconvenience of having to travel to Dublin, through the provision of world-class facilities on a more localised basis," he added.
The centre will feature a diagnostics facility run by Global Diagnostics Ireland Ltd. It will include a fixed MRI unit, a fixed 64-slice CT scanner, ultrasound and x-ray.
"The facility will offer telemedicine through instant contact with Global Diagnostics' worldwide network of clinics, with the ability to source online professional analysis and reports within 20 minutes," Vista said in a statement.
There will also be a pharmacy operated in partnership with a local company opening seven days a week and catering for after-hours and emergency requirements.
Vista says the centre will also be "ideal" for specialist services such as sports medicine, female and male health screening, and obesity clinics and fertility clinics.