Greenfield site offers light at end of tunnel for Galway Hospice

Galway Hospice Foundation has agreed to purchase land from the HSE, bringing its vision for a new hospice on a greenfield site another step closer to reality.

The hospice will use the 14-acre site adjacent to Merlin Park Hospital, on the main Dublin Road, to develop a large, future-proofed hospice facility in a woodland setting with substantial support facilities for patients and their families.

Accessible through a planned new roadway opening from the signalled junction at Doughiska, initially it will have 26-beds within a five year timeframe.

It will cost at least €15 million to realise and the site is large enough for the facility to double in size to 50 beds to meet the foundation’s vision and Galway’s future needs for palliative and hospice care.

Speaking on Tuesday, on his last day after twelve years as CEO, Sean O’Healy said the hospice has agreed to purchase the land for an undisclosed sum which he described as “reasonable and modest relative to current land prices”.

Mr O’Healy says the organisation will have to fight and lobby hard to secure Government funding for the project but as of now, it has no State monies and the €15 million will have to be raised through a separate fundraising drive so as not to compromise the existing services.

The Galway Hospice has twelve beds at its home in Renmore and it is currently expanding and adding a further six temporary beds.

Mr O’Healy says the expansion of the current site will continue despite this announcement as extra beds are needed to meet demand on services.

The plan is to have the new 26-bed unit opened within a five-year target, and the planning application will be lodged within a year.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.