Donnelly Opens Bray Primary Care Centre

A bucket list beauty…

atest press release from Minister Stephen Donnelly, issued on Friday, 20th May 2022…

Today, Friday 20th May 2022, the Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly TD, officially opened the HSE Primary Care Centre and Integrated Care Hub in Bray, part of the national Enhanced Community Care (ECC) programme.

The ECC programme is already making progress, aiming to reduce pressure on services and dependence on the hospital-centric model of care through enhanced and increased community services.

Speaking at the opening event, Minister Donnelly said: “79 Community Healthcare Networks and 27 Community Specialist Teams of the new Enhanced Community Care (ECC) Programme have already been established nationally, with over 2,000 staff already recruited or at an advanced stage of employment, with a further 1,700 planned during 2022.

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“The national Enhanced Community Care programme is at its core a reform programme, representing an investment of €240 million to develop and enhance care in the community. It has been developed under the Sláintecare Programme to ensure all HSE primary and community care services work together effectively.”

Developed as part of implementing Sláintecare, the ECC programme aims to ensure all HSE primary and community care services work in an integrated way to meet population health needs across Ireland, to reduce dependence on hospital services and provide access to consultant-led specialist services in the community. 19 community specialist teams for older persons and 8 chronic disease community specialist teams have been established, and 21 community intervention teams are now in place with national coverage. Community diagnostic services have provided over 139,000 scans to patients in 2021, and over 75,000 scans already in 2022.

Welcoming everyone to the event, Martina Queally, Chief Officer of HSE Community Healthcare East said: “The new Primary Care Centre and the Integrated Care Hub in Bray help us advance the ECC vision of providing accessible, integrated, and high quality services closer to people’s homes. It shows that the move towards more primary and community care is becoming a reality in Community Healthcare East.

“The new Primary Care Centre in Bray accommodates a range of primary care, mental health and community services within a single integrated, modern facility, and will improve access to a broad range of services to the local community. The Integrated Care Hub in Bray offers access to specialist services in the community for older people and people living with more complex chronic disease.

“Collaboration and shared governance is pivotal to the successful implementation of our ECC programme. I would like to acknowledge the GP and Consultant leads and our colleagues in Ireland East Hospital Group, St Vincent’s, St. Michael’s and St. Colmcille’s hospitals for the time and commitment they’ve provided to the development of the ECC programme in Community Healthcare East so far. I would also like to thank the large number of people involved in the development of the physical infrastructure required to support this programme, as well as those supporting the reorganisation of patient pathways of care.”

· 79 community healthcare networks and 27 community specialist teams established nationally

· Community intervention teams and expanded community diagnostics are providing tailored local services to patients across Ireland

· ECC represents an overall €240 million investment in community health services that will reduce pressure on services and dependence on hospitals

Speaking at the event, Anne O’Connor, HSE Chief Operations Officer said: “This transformational programme will include 96 Community Healthcare Networks (CHNs), 30 Community Specialist Teams for Older Persons, 30 Community Specialist Teams for Chronic Disease and 3,500 additional staff when fully implemented. This marks a very significant step in supporting older people and people living with chronic disease by bringing specialist services closer to local communities, reducing pressure and dependence on hospital services.

“An essential theme underlying this programme is developing a new, integrated model of care, which is responsive to the needs of local communities. This requires strong leadership and ownership at local level, bringing the relationship between General Practice, primary care and specialist community care into a much more patient focused and integrated model of care in each locality.”

Commenting on the ECC initiative’s progress, Dr Colm Henry, HSE Chief Clinical Officer said: “The work that has been undertaken by the Integrated Care Programmes for Older People and Chronic Disease over recent years has shown that we can achieve much improved outcomes, particularly for older people who are frail, and those with chronic disease. The new model of care allows the specialist multidisciplinary team to engage and interact with services at community healthcare network level, supporting people in their diagnosis and on-going care. With the support of the Dept of Health and Sláintecare, these models are now being implemented at scale, by the HSE, with the establishment and full rollout of 30 Community Specialist Teams for Older People and 30 Specialist Teams for Chronic Disease.”

For more information about Enhanced Community Care (ECC) please visit here.