Minister says new top-level facility may be built near University Hospital Limerick

THE HEALTH Minister has said it is “not impossible” that a second model four  hospital, similar in scale and services to University Hospital Limerick (UHL), could be built just minutes away.

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill was speaking this Tuesday morning after confirming that the HSE had purchased a 43-acre parcel of land for €14m, just two kilometres from the hospital campus in Dooradoyle.

She says she will appoint a project board to report on the best uses for the sites.

WATCH: Minister for Health confirms purchase of 'strategic site' for new Limerick hospital

A report carried out by the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) identified a number of options to tackle the overcrowding crisis at UHL.

The three options were: Option A – expand capacity at UHL on the Dooradoyle site; Option B – extend the UHL hospital campus to comprise the existing Dooradoyle site and another site, in close proximity to UHL, to support the delivery of healthcare services under a single governance; and Option C – develop a model three hospital in the HSE Mid West, providing a second emergency department for the region.

The move to purchase the land near UHL came as a direct response to the report, published last September.

Crucially, the HIQA report recommended a model three hospital be delivered for the region in the long-term.  These provide emergency care, but without specialist services.

However, the Minister has said the scale of the newly-acquired site provides for greater ambition - including a model four facility, which would in essence provide the same services as UHL does.

Asked if it’s her preference to have two model four hospitals within 10 minutes of each other, she said: “That's not impossible. But that again depends on what is brought to me by the project board. You can clearly see that's a possibility for the future."

Having this site, Ms MacNeill said: “allows us to go considerably beyond the thinking of the HIQA report. This is HIQA BC+, and I don't think it is limited in any way, particularly when we look at the scale of the site. We have gone and bought a site which gives us Option B, Option C and Option C+ very considerably. It allows us to push ahead in a much more ambitious way than the HIQA report which was being asked to look at how we deal with urgent and emergency care.”

She added: “Everything is on the table” due to the nature of the site acquired.

“This is a blank page of what I want to do, to meet the needs of the people of the region. That includes more access in terms of urgent emergency care both in terms of primary care, both in terms of GPs and in terms of the hospital”.

The Health Minister praised staff of UHL, pointing to the fact there were 47 people waiting on trolleys in the emergency department this Tuesday.

This is 20 less than on this day 12 months ago.

“It is a significant improvement and that is in the context of very considerably increased presentations to UHL,” she said.

Mayor John Moran has welcomed the announcement of the site acquisition, saying: "I doubt there will be many other days of such important consequence during my term."

In a post on his blog, he added: "It is hard to over-emphasise how great this news is for the Mid-West. Better healthcare facilities are long overdue. We have all heard too many devastating stories from our Mid-West hospitals as a result of decades of under-investment."

"But things have been changing and changing for the better. In the two short years since my election, we’ve welcomed the opening of the new Bons Secours hospital in late 2025, the construction of almost 200 new beds at UHL, the building commencement of a new cancer centre in Moyross and a new surgical hub on O’Connell Avenue. But without a doubt this is the most important news of all. I want to congratulate the Minister and our local HSE leadership for getting this over the line," he added.