Leaking theatres still closed despite completion of repair works

Galway City Tribune – Two theatres at Merlin Park Hospital remain closed – two months after leaks in the roof were repaired.

Repair works on the theatres were completed on November 1, but red tape is stalling the reopening of the facility.

Meanwhile, hundreds of procedures were postponed because the theatres were closed since September 13 to allow for repairs. Around 700 people whose operations were cancelled remain in limbo as the New Year approaches.

Galway City Councillor Pádraig Conneely (FG) has slammed the HSE West for its ‘lack of urgency’ in getting the facility reopened.

The HSE has informed Councillor Conneely that it is awaiting an ‘external clinical risk assessment’ to be carried out before the theatres can be reopened.

This risk assessment was requested on November 1 but still hasn’t been carried out.

“There is no sense of urgency on the part of the HSE in getting these theatres reopened,” said Cllr Conneely.

“The roof repairs were completed in early November and an external clinical risk assessment was requested but still hasn’t been carried out. I’m told the new theatres have been repaired to a high standard, and they’re ready to go again.

“I’m told there is a national forum for risk assessment in the HSE and Merlin Park wrote to that forum on November 1 requesting a risk assessment and we’re now two months on and it still hasn’t been carried out. I asked if they had followed up the letter with a phone call, to say how urgent this is, and they said they didn’t. They just wrote a letter and waited two months and still haven’t received a reply, let alone a commitment of when the assessment will be carried out.

“There is no sense of urgency in the HSE to get this assessment completed.”

Cllr Conneely, a member of the HSE West Regional Forum, said the HSE hasn’t given a timeframe for when the theatres will reopen.

“Patients are suffering, and the HSE has no timeframe of when admissions resume. Management of University Hospital Galway and Merlin Park should be more proactive to ensure the two theatres are reopened, and give certainty to the hundreds of patients on the waiting list when their procedures will be performed,” he added.