Hospital Services

98. Deputy Thomas Gould asked the Minister for Health if she will report on the potential closure of the DOMINO scheme in CUMH. [72876/26]

I am taking this question on behalf of Deputy Gould. I ask the Minister to report on the potential closure of the DOMINO scheme in CUMH. I am conscious she gave quite a detailed reply to Deputy Rice earlier.

I appreciate that. There is no closure of the scheme. Some senior midwives are on maternity leave and the service has been reorganised to make sure the right people are in the right place according to clinical need. Some midwives have moved to the labour ward. It is very much a temporary solution. Women will continue to be supported through the early transfer home midwifery team, which is very important. We are fully committed to maintaining and improving the women's health services in the south west. It is one of the regions that had pilot postnatal hopes which operate in Ballincollig, Clonakilty, Mallow, and Carrigtwohill. I recently launched the hub in Tralee, which is another example of an excellent midwifery service being delivered to women in the community. Staffing has increased very considerably. In the maternity hospital in Cork, overall staffing increased by 16% since December 2023. Just this year it increased by 5.3%. It is a highly valued scheme. It continues to operate today. It will continue to operate. They have temporarily redeployed some of the senior staff arising from other maternity leave but it is very much a temporary piece and women continue to be supported.

There is something peculiar going on here. I do not live in Cork so I do not have first hand experience of that scheme. I am a big fan of community midwife care, but I know because I have told that midwives who want to work on that scheme have contacted Deputy Gould. They applied but were told the roles were not being filled. There is a peculiarity going on here. It sounds like an administrative issue that needs to be resolved as a priority but it is incredibly unfair on the mums to be out there because they are hearing this service is curtailed, reduced or there is something going on there. I am thinking of a pregnant woman going through what can be quite a difficult time hearing these things in the media, the press, the shopping centre or wherever. This needs to be put to bed and there need to be questions asked about whether midwives are applying for jobs only to be told those roles are not to be filled.

Neither the Deputy nor I live in that region but obviously I have had the benefit of studying the recruitment growth in the region for some time and the south-west region has recruited more than any other. It has recruited more than Deputy Clarke's region, Deputy Dolan's region or those of Deputies Byrne and Neville. It recruited nearly 800 people in the first part of the year so the idea there are vacancies or services not being delivered when it recruited twice as many people as the region next door or any other region is very challenging. There have been a series of media reports about vacancies or difficulties that are not consistent with the level of recruitment that has happened in the region. Certainly on a comparative basis I would struggle to be in a hospital in another part of the country or a different region recognising how much more the Cork region has recruited, yet services cannot be delivered there. That is a more general point because the Deputy is right that all those stories are frightening. Deputy Clarke raised the diabetes issue which is a very particular, discrete and nuanced issue that arises from very specific vacancies. I spoke with the chief nursing officer about the domino scheme. She said she had spoken with the regional midwife. Services have been reorganised appropriately on a temporary basis for patient safety. The scheme continues and continues to support women.

The Minister spoke about recruitment into the wider region and the more professionals we have in our health service the better for delivery of services. However, the question that immediately comes to my mind is whether they are being recruited into this service because that does not seem to be the experience of mums there. There is a lady in Cork who is on her third pregnancy. Her first two were through the domino scheme. She had nothing but positive experiences and speaks overwhelmingly positively about the treatment, care and support she got there. She is now saying she is frustrated, concerned and appalled the service will not be the same when she needs it this time around. There have definitely been changes that are impacting on the woman's experience of receiving the service. Regarding the women who have reached out to Deputy Gould's office, there is something there I ask the Minister to look into more closely because I do not believe for a moment they are inventing experiences. They are venting because of their experiences but that comes from somewhere. I ask the Minister to go back and have a look.

There is no difficulty. I acknowledge the scheme has changed on a temporary basis but women continue to be supported through the early transfer home midwifery team. The scheme has changed on a temporary basis arising from redeployment within the model in the maternity hospital generally, arising from specific maternity absences. However, that hospital has had an increase in staff this year of 5.3% on the back of a 16% increase so there has been recruitment all the time over the last two and a half years into that hospital.

Was it into that service?

Yes, but there are 56 women in that service at the moment. They continue to be supported by the early transfer home midwifery team. As I said to Deputy Ward, any change of midwifery would give me cause for concern because you want to know you are going to have the same standard of care and the same experience and you do not want changes. I understand that. This is very much a temporary measure arising from those specific maternity vacancies and it will restart fully in the same way in early 2027. As I said, those women are being supported through the early transfer midwifery team.