ST LUKE’S Hospital in Rathgar, Dublin, will be retained as a public health facility after its cancer services are closed in 2014, Minister for Health Mary Harney has said.
The hospital might be used for both palliative care and long-term care, the Minister told a Dáil Committee on Health yesterday.
The committee was discussing a Bill which will see radiation oncology services at St Luke’s Hospital transferred to St James’s Hospital and Beaumont Hospital.
The Health (Miscellaneous) Bill 2010 will dissolve the St Luke’s Hospital board and transfer its staff, assets and liabilities to the Health Service Executive (HSE).
Ms Harney also assured the committee the hospital would not be sold and that its ethos would be maintained. However, Save St Luke’s campaigners, who sat in the gallery, were not satisfied with the proposed change of use.
“Its a black day and a bad day for cancer patients,” and a “backward step in cancer care”, former patient at the hospital, Nancy Browne said after the meeting.
“You cannot dismiss the positive effects the environment can have on your treatment,” she said, describing the site of 18 acres and mature gardens as “the most peaceful spot on earth”.
St Luke’s has provided oncology services for more than 50 years and was the State’s main radiotherapy treatment centre.
The decision to move its cancer services was based on a 2003 expert report on radiotherapy (the Hollywood report), which indicated the three modalities of cancer treatment – surgery, chemotherapy and radiotherapy – should be provided on one site.
At the committee meeting, Labour health spokeswoman Jan O’Sullivan proposed an amendment to the Bill that the hospital could only be used for medical purposes related to cancer treatment and could not be sold.
Such a change would help to maintain the hospital’s “unique atmosphere” about which so many people testify, Ms O’Sullivan said.
However, Ms Harney did not want to make such a prescriptive amendment to the legislation before she saw proposals from the board of St Luke’s Hospital.
The site would be retained for public health services which might be a combination of palliative care (including non-cancer care) and long-term care, she said.
Ms O’Sullivan’s amendment was defeated in a vote by a majority of the committee.
Despite the verbal promise by Ms Harney, there was a “need to pin down that it would be used for public health,” Ms O’Sullivan said.
There was a genuine fear that the site would be sold off and a verbal commitment was not enough, she said.
Ms Harney assured the committee St Luke’s would not be sold. Land near the city centre for public health use was hard to get and because there would be a growing demand for health services, St Luke’s would be used.
There was a recurring theme in the HSE of taking away services today on the promise of nirvana which tomorrow which does not come, Fine Gael TD Dr James Reilly said.