Daisy Hill Hospital Profile 2012
Daisy Hill Hospital Profile Mairead McAlinden, Southern Trust Chief Executive, and Chair Roberta Brownlee welcome Health Minister Edwin Poots on a recent visit to Daisy Hill Hospital Daisy Hill Hospital is based in the city of Newry and is an essential part of the hospital network provided by the Southern Trust. The Trust s acute hospital network; Daisy Hill and Craigavon Hospital now serve a population of over 360,000 with patients being treated in both hospitals from outside the southern area. Diagnostic, outpatient and day case procedures are also provided in South Tyrone Hospital, and non-acute hospital care for older people is provided in Lurgan and South Tyrone Hospitals. Demographic Trends The population within the Southern Trust is now the 2 nd largest in Northern Ireland (358,600 people), and the fastest growing the population has increased by more than twice the NI average since 2000 (16.7% compared to NI average of 6.5%). It is projected that Southern Trust population will grow by 20.6% from 2008-2023 - the highest projected growth in Northern Ireland (average is 9.6%). By 2023, a 69% increase is projected in Southern Trust population aged 75+ (compared to NI average of 55%). The fastest growing population aged 0-17 is also within the Southern area (18% increase projected between 2008 and 2023 compared to 3.2% for NI). Births in the Southern area increased by 37% over the last decade compared to the NI average of 18%. Daisy Hill s natural catchment is a rural population stretching from as far as Castlewellan in the north to include Banbridge, Kilkeel, Newry, Armagh right through to Louth in the Republic of Ireland. However Daisy Hill provides care and treatment to patients from across the Southern area for specialist renal services and the Trust provides Daisy Hill as a choice to patients depending on geography and where waiting lists are shorter.
Daisy Hill has a 24 hour Emergency Department, Maternity Department, Special Care Baby Unit, inpatient beds in Medicine, Stroke, Rehabilitation, Surgery, Gynaecology, ENT and Paediatrics. There is a Coronary Care Unit, Surgical High Dependency Unit and a Day Procedure Unit and Radiography Department. There is also an adult Sub-regional Haemodialysis Unit which an area-wide service containing 28 Renal stations. The GP Out of Hours service is also based at Daisy Hill. A wide range of diagnostic and therapy services are provided with radiology including CT scanning, cardiology investigations and a 24 hour Laboratory service. Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy, Podiatry, Speech and Language Therapy and Dietetics are all on-site. Orthoptics clinics are also provided. A range of Mental Health services are also provided on the Daisy Hill site. Under our Changing for Children strategy, the Trust also proposes to locate a new area-wide Paediatric Centre of Excellence at Daisy Hill Hospital. This would include a children s only theatre for all planned paediatric surgery with associated ward and a dedicated outpatients department. The proposals would help the Trust to meet the latest quality care standards from the DHSSPS which recommend that planned paediatric ENT and general surgery is provided in a dedicated child friendly environment by staff specifically trained to care for children. Daisy Hill is the preferred location for this service in terms of quality, accommodation and environment, accessibility and ease of implementation. Emergency care for children will continue to be provided from Craigavon and Daisy Hill Hospitals, and paediatric ambulatory services will be enhanced at Craigavon Daisy Hill and South Tyrone hospitals. Cross Border Activity A significant number of people from the border areas of the Republic of Ireland choose to use Daisy Hill Hospital as private patients, particularly for Maternity and Emergency services. The number of cross border patients attending the Emergency Department has increased year on year since 2007. Last year 1066 patients from the ROI attended the Emergency Department, resulting in 130 admissions to wards. 190 babies were born in DHH to ROI mothers in 2011. In 2010 the figure was 197 and 292 in 2009. There are currently five patients from the North Eastern Board in the ROI attending the hospital s Renal Unit three times per week for haemodialysis. Through the health and social care partnership, CAWT, the Trust has established a cross-border ENT (ear, nose and throat) service with the HSE Dublin North East. Trust Consultants now cover outpatient appointments at Monaghan hospital and patients from the Dublin North East area can access inpatient care at either Daisy Hill or Craigavon Area Hospital. The partnership has allowed the Trust to expand and enhance its ENT service. The Trust is currently developing plans to introduce cross border Community Dental and Ophthalmology services from Daisy Hill and to expand the ENT service.
Key Facts: Daisy Hill Hospital The Daisy Hill Emergency Department (ED) sees over 36,000 first time patients each year and 25-30 % of these are children. 95% of patients are seen within four hours, meeting the Ministerial waiting time standard for ED. This ED activity is double the number DHH was originally designed to cater for, and so the Trust has recently invested in improved ED accommodation and facilities, with further investment planned this year as attendances are projected to rise to 50,000 in the next 5-10 years. Over 2,000 babies are born in Daisy Hill Hospital each year. There are 210 Inpatient beds in the Hospital. In 2010/11 there were over 18,000 elective (planned) and non-elective (emergency) episodes and 5,500 day cases treated in Daisy Hill Hospital. 70,000 Outpatients are seen each year in Daisy Hill Hospital. Daisy Hill Hospital and Craigavon Area Hospital are two of seven acute hospitals in Northern Ireland that have been designated Queen s University teaching hospitals.
Investment and Modernisation in Daisy Hill Hospital The priority for the Trust is to ensure that Daisy Hill continues to offer a standard of safe and high quality service expected in a modern acute hospital in an effective and efficient way. There is an on-going programme of modernisation and development at Daisy Hill Hospital. The Trust has invested 3.7million in the infrastructure at Daisy Hill Hospital in the last year as part of a long term commitment to acute services in Newry, including the refurbishment of the Accident and Emergency Department, the relocation of Gynaecology and Antenatal out patients departments to improved accommodation, building a new waste transfer station and upgrade of the electrical infrastructure. Between 2008 and 2010 0.5 million has been invested in the Special Care Baby Unit and a similar amount has been invested in upgrading the maternity unit at Daisy Hill Hospital. Significant investment in technology to strengthen the link between sites and for staff in Daisy Hill Hospital to engage quickly with colleagues in Craigavon Area Hospital. For example, active support and involvement from ICU specialists at Craigavon Area Hospital is now available to staff treating acutely ill patients in Daisy Hill via a new state-of-art robot which provides a live link between medical staff in different locations in the Trust. Improved organisation of services and the use of new technology mean that patients can now be assessed, diagnosed and treated much faster than previously. This greatly reduces the need for patients to stay overnight in hospital as advances ensure that patients who previously may have been in hospital for 3 or 4 days may only have to be in hospital for 3 or 4 hours. This means that 8 beds can be removed (e.g. in Coronary Care Unit) because they will simply no longer be needed. The Emergency Department at Daisy Hill is currently being modernised and upgraded as part of a 2-phase refurbishment programme. Phase one of the refurbishment cost 400,000 and included an extension to house a new three bay resuscitation area and a four bay treatment unit for more stable patients, thus doubling the size of A&E department. This became operational in Autumn 2011.
Future Developments at Daisy Hill Hospital The second phase development of the Emergency Department at Daisy Hill will provide improved facilities for children, more minor and majors areas and will also provide high standard isolation facilities to comply with best practice in infection control. The development is valued at 490,000 and is due to be completed April 2012. The amalgamation of the High Dependency Unit and Coronary Care services into a dedicated 10 bed unit on level 3 will combine the specialist skills of the medical and nursing teams to provide a high quality unit for seriously ill patients. The new unit, costing 500,000 to create, is due to be completed in February 2012. Coronary care beds for more stable patients will continue to be provided on Level 5. The Trust has developed a business case for the re-development of theatres at Daisy Hill Hospital. The total Project cost is 3.8 million which includes 1 theatre and 10 recovery beds to replace the existing Day Procedures Unit and 1 new theatre with 4 recovery beds (the additional theatre cost is 2M). The case has been submitted to the DHSSPS for approval - November 2011. It is expected that the timescale for the total project is 7 months. Acute hospital services in Northern Ireland face a challenging environment. Daisy Hill must continue to improve the safety, quality, effectiveness and efficiency of its services as a key part of the Trust s hospital network. Practices that were used a decade ago may not be the best care for patients now look at how more procedures can be done as day surgery; patients with chronic illness can be supported at home, and more specialist services are now available in the community. Hospital practice is driven by worldwide advances in care Daisy Hill services must function to the same internationally recognised standards of care that apply in similar-sized hospitals in the UK and Europe these standards are drivers for improvement and change across our hospital network. Change isn t limited to Daisy Hill Craigavon Area Hospital has also undergone major changes over the last few years, with fewer beds, reorganisation of wards and more patients being treated as day patients or through day surgery.