This article is from page 3 of the 2007-08-07 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 3 JPG
ENNIS General Hospital is the sixth dirtiest hospital in the country, ac- cording to a survey of patients and their families. The survey, which was conducted by irishhealth.com, placed Ennis General Hospital in 42nd posi- tion in a list of all 47 hospitals and medical institutions in Ireland.
A total of 8,000 people took part in the online survey, with 111 people contributing a rating for Ennis Gen- eral Hospital.
The hospital received an average
rating of 2.68 out of five from patients and family or 54 per cent.
There was also bad news for the Mid-Western Regional Maternity Hospital in Limerick which was rated in 43rd position, one worse than En- nis General.
Almost half of all Clare’s expectant mothers travel to the Mid-Western Regional Maternity Hospital in Lim- erick to have their babies, with the rest travelling to hospitals in Galway.
Responding to the rating, a spokes- women from the HSE urged patients to go through the official complaints
system if they are not happy with their level of care.
“We do take note of all feedback but we do have an established complains procedure in the hospitals and people should go through that system instead of making anonymous complaints,” said the HSE spokeswoman.
“We cannot take corrective action on complaints if we do not know what the complaint are about. If peo- ple have complaints, they should go through the complaints procedure which exists in each hospital.”
The only hospitals to feature worse
scores than Ennis General and the Limerick Maternity Hospital were Kerry General Hospital, the Coombe Women’s Hospital, Waterford Re- gional and Our Lady of Lourdes Hos- pital in Drogheda.
The Mid-Western Regional Hospital in Limerick finished in 41st position while the University College Hospital in Galway and Merlin Park Regional Hospital in Galway finished in 38th and 29th place respectively.
Mallow General Hospital was rated the cleanest hospital in Ireland, fol- lowed by St John’s Hospital in Limer-
ick and the Rotunda Hospital Dublin.
Meanwhile, the third National Hy- giene Audit is currently being under- taken by the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA).
Each hospital completed self-as- sessments in March of this year and HIQA are currently midway through a process of unannounced visits to hospitals.
The organisation hopes to have completed the process by mid-Sep- tember with a report on its findings due for publication at the beginning of October.