Naughten calls for emergency Dáil committee meeting

In Health by Denis Naughten

Home help to be slashed by 16 hours every minute, as care packages fact a 50% cut.

Member of the Joint Committee on Health and Children, Denis Naughten TD, has written to the Chairman of the Committee calling for an emergency meeting to discuss the announced cuts. According to Denis Naughten, home help co-ordinators throughout the Country have to slash 16hrs of home support every minute to achieve the target set for them by the HSE.

Naughten explained: ‘While the HSE claims that “the impact of these reductions will be minimised by ensuring that services are provided for direct patient care” the fact is that on foot of previous cuts to home help over the last number of years, home help is only provided for direct patient care presently.

The only way that the cut of 635,000 hours (when compared to last year) can be achieved, is by reducing patient contact allocations from 1hr to 30mins, but this will also increase the amount of travel that home helps clock up, thereby further reducing patient contact, leading to a greater reduction in the quality of the service.

Furthermore, the allocation of home care packages is to be reduced by 200 or 50% every month clearly runs contrary to Government policy which is that older people are to receive community supports such as home help, home care packages and intermediate care rather than long-term residential care.

While the disincentives to long term care have been put in place, the reciprocal more cost efficient supports have not materialised and those in place are being slashed to get the HSE to balance its budget.’

‘These cuts will leave older people more isolated, more vulnerable and at higher risk of being admitted to hospital, which will put even more pressure on the overspending on hospital budgets’ concluded Denis Naughten.