Special Delivery Unit

Responsibilities

National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF)

SDU Staff

Contact the SDU

Information on the Special Delivery Unit initatives

Responsibilities

The Special Delivery Unit (SDU) was established to unblock access to acute services by improving the flow of patients through the system. The SDU is focusing initially on emergency departments and is working to support hospitals in addressing excessive waiting times for admission to hospital. The SDU is working closely with key teams in the HSE and the NTPF, building on initiatives already underway including the clinical programmes. The SDU will provide a performance management function for the Irish hospital system and will drive down waiting times.

The SDU’s priorities encompass:

  • Emergency Departments – waiting times for admission have been unacceptably high in a number of hospitals, often breaching the current 6-hour maximum waiting time target
  • In-patient waiting times – the trend has been upwards recently, despite the work of the NTPF
  • Out-patient waiting times – the time from GP referral to an appointment with a consultant is unacceptably long in many specialties
  • Access to diagnostics – this forms an essential part of the patient journey for all of the areas of access above

National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF)

  • The NTPF’s resources will be re-focused to align closely with the SDU’s work and the remaining NTPF funding will be used for patient care in its widest sense ie for specific initiatives or projects or for direct referrals of patients for treatment.
  • As a priority the Minister instructed public hospitals to ensure that, by the end of 2011, they have no patients waiting more than 12 months for treatment.
  • The NTPF is working closely with the HSE and the SDU to acheive this target
  • www.ntpf.ie

Staff Contact Details

Chief Operating Officer Tony O'Brien
Principal Officer Simonetta Ryan
Director of Performance Improvement Dr. Alan Smith
General Manager Jim O'Sullivan
Assistant Principal Officer Kieran Smyth
Higher Executive Officer Nicola Mathews
Higher Executive Officer Cathy Lyons
Executive Officer Cormac Fitzgerald
Executive Officer Bryan King
Clerical Officer Pauline Clifford

The other members of staff of the Special Delivery Unit, who have been seconded from the HSE/RCSI, are:

Strategic Leads in Bed Management and Discharge Planning Mary Boyd
Ann Keating
Performance Improvement Specialists Frank McGuinness
John McLoughlin
Emergency Department Information Project Manager John Joyce
Personal Assistant to Tony O'Brien Eileen O'Connor

Telephone: 01 635 4000

Fax:: 01 635 3223