Public hospital patients are being forced to wait longer for treatment because some consultants are treating too many private patients in public beds, Labour claimed last night.
The party's health spokeswoman, Ms Liz McManus, circulated official figures which showed that many public hospitals are breaching a requirement to use a maximum of 20 per cent of their capacity for private patients. Ms McManus said that only 20 of the 60 publicly-funded hospitals used less than 20 per cent of their capacity for private patients.
The figures for 2002 were provided by the Minister for Health, Mr Martin, in the past week following a parliamentary question from Ms McManus in May.
They show that the total number of private patients as a percentage of all patients in the hospitals was 25 per cent, some 5 percentage points higher than the maximum laid out in in the hospital consultants common contract. St John's Hospital in Limerick had the highest percentage of private patients at 57 per cent. St Nessan's Regional Orthopaedic Hospital in Limerick had 51 per cent in private care.
More than 40 per cent of the patients in six other hospitals were in private care. The hospitals were: the National Maternity Hospital at Holles Street, the Coombe Women's Hospital and the Eye and Ear, all in Dublin; Cork hospitals, the South Infirmary-Victoria and Mallow General; and Limerick Regional. Ms McManus claimed Mr Martin had failed to ensure the delivery of the requirement to use 80 per cent of the beds in public hospitals for public patients.
"The result of this overuse of public facilities by consultants for their private patients is that public patients are facing ever-longer delays for treatment," she said.
"The Minister for Health continues to speak about the need for equity in the hospital service, but these figures show that we are further away than ever from achieving this objective," she added. Ms McManus said the position had been made worse by the closure of public beds while those designated for private use "remained untouched".
"I have no wish to see private patients wait a day longer for care than they do at present, but this should not be achieved at the expense of those who cannot afford to pay for private medical insurance." A universal system of health insurance was the ideal way to redress the balance, she said.
A spokesman for Mr Martin said last night that it was a matter for individual health boards to ensure that the mix of activity in their area was "as close as possible" to the 80-20 division set out in the consultants common contract.
Responding to the claim by Ms McManus that public patients had to wait longer for treatment because of the failure to meet the criteria, he said it was open to such patients to apply to the National Treatment Purchase Fund if they were on a waiting list for more than three months.
