Monthly Archives: November, 2018

Following many years of getting by, the Irish health services were now moving into a phase of limited, but insufficient, incremental growth and it was important for managers to pause, reflect and see how they might do things differently, HMI President, Lucy Nugent said when she officially opened the 2018 HMI Annual Conference in the RDS last week.

Ireland needed a new type of social care system and a recalibration of care to primary and community-based care, Prof. Eamon O’Shea, Director, Centre for Economic and Social Research on Dementia, NUI, Galway, told the conference.

There was no ‘right’ leadership style, but Irish managers who wanted to be effective leaders should live the dream and distribute leadership in their organisation through coaching, Dr. Simon Boucher, Chief Executive Officer, Irish Management Institute, told the Conference.

A partnership approach - which included citizen engagement, frontline enablement, political buy in and buy in by the wider determinants stakeholders - was critical to the implementation of Sláintecare, Laura Magahy, Executive Director, Sláintecare, told the Conference.

HMI Members have been urged to attend the 2019 Conference of the European Association of Hospital Managers (EAHM) in Belgium, next September.

Hospitals could have the best inventions in the world, but if they were not introduced in the best interests of patients, they would not be beneficial, Dr. Magda Rosenmöller, Academic Director, IESE Business School, the graduate business school of the University of Navarra in Spain, told the Conference.

The Shift Left Strategy, which was aimed at providing the highest quality of life at the lowest possible cost, involved finding and sequencing eHealth interventions to drive and improve quality of life and reduce the cost of care, Prof. Martin Curley, Chief Information Officer, GSE and CO, eHealth Ireland, told the Conference.

The Insight Centre for Data Analytics at University College Cork would like to see if they could reduce hospital outpatient waiting lists by building a tool which would allow health managers to understand the consequences of what might seem to them very small decisions, Prof Barry O’Sullivan, MRIA, Director, Insight Centre for Data Analytics, University College, Cork, Vice Chair, European Commission High-Level Expert Group on AI and President, European Artificial Intelligence Association, told the Conference.

As a company, GSK talked a lot about partnering with the health services and its relationship with the HMI was one partnership that they really valued, Mr. Liam Cullen, External Affairs Director, GSK, told the Conference. This was GSK’s 7th year as main sponsor of the HMI conference and regional events.

There were four immediate reforms required in the Irish health services, Prof. John Higgins, Professor of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, Clinical Director for Maternity Services South/Southwest Hospital Group, told the Conference.

Dr. Colin Doherty, Consultant Neurologist, St. James’s Hospital, Dublin, agreed with the view of Prof. Higgins that love and care were crucial in delivering health services.

Ireland has a relatively small health system, but we are very skilled at making things complicated, Anne O’Connor, Deputy Director General, Chief Operations Officer, HSE, told the Conference.

Ms. Patricia Doherty, Director, Voluntary Healthcare Forum said she represented one slice of the health service leadership.

The top reasons for suing in medical negligence cases were to know what happened and why it happened, out of concern that nobody else would have to go through the same circumstances, Roger Murray, Joint Managing Partner, Callan Tansey, Solicitors, told the Conference.

Closing the Conference, HMI President, Lucy Nugent thanked all those who had attended, the speakers, sponsors, Valerie Twomey of NRH, Conor Hannaway and Rosemarie Carroll of SHRC, HMI’s business partner, for organising the conference and the RDS staff.