Search for new IHCA Secretary General ‘ongoing’

The process to recruit a new IHCA Secretary General is “ongoing”, an Association spokesperson told the Medical Independent (MI).

The spokesperson did not indicate when the search is expected to be completed.

They confirmed Assistant Secretary General Alice McGarvey and Senior Executive Officer Aidan O’ Reilly will continue to act as Secretary General on an interim basis.

In December, the IHCA announced the retirement of Mr Martin Varley, who had “dedicated 17 years of his career to the Association”, with over twelve years Secretary General.

“Throughout, he has led with dedication and determination,” the Association said in its statement.

Separately, the IHCA spokesperson told MI the Association believes “approximately 5,000 additional public hospital beds should be funded by 2030 – or around 700 extra hospital beds each year for the next seven years”.

The Association released a statement on the publication of the HSE National Service Plan 2024 (NSP 2024), which was published earlier this month, that was critical of the document.

The statement pointed to the plan’s “lack of commitment …to open a specified number of additional general acute hospital beds this year.”

Asked by this newspaper to clarify how many beds it wanted to be included in the plan, the IHCA spokesperson said the first step must be “the rapid delivery of the 1,500 acute beds the Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly committed to open in 2024″.

“Regrettably the NSP 2024 fails to commit to open any specified number of additional general acute hospital beds this year. Separately, Minister Donnelly has indicated just 147 additional beds are expected to be opened in 2024,” the spokesperson told MI.

On its repeated call for additional beds, the IHCA spokesperson said “the rationale for such a significant expansion of capacity is clear”.

They highlighted that Ireland “has one of the lowest numbers” of acute hospital beds in the EU.

The IHCA has previously recommended that a minimum of 6,000 additional public hospital beds were needed by 2030, over and above the base figure at the beginning of 2020.