Our Lady of Lourdes
Drogheda
Co. Louth

Tel: (041) 9837601

Existing Activity Levels and Service Details -

Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital is part of the Louth Meath Hospital Group and provides a general acute hospital service to the catchment area of Louth, Meath  and North Dublin.  

In addition a number of regional services are based at Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital as follows:

• Regional Centre Symptomatic Breast Service
• Emergency Medicine – Trauma Centre
• Palliative Care.

The range of acute services are as follows:

• General Medicine.
• General Surgery.
• Obstetrics/Gynaecology.
• Paediatrics incl Neonatal services
• E.N.T.
• Orthopaedics.
• Oncology
• Urology
• Dermatology
• Day Services.
• Out-patient Services.
• Pathology Services.
• Radiology Services.
• Physical Medicine Services.
• Speech and Language services
• Social work
• ICU/CCU

The bed complement at 1/1/2003 is as follows:

99 General Medicine
45 General Surgery
27 Orthopaedic
55 Obstetrics
17 Gynaecology
50 Paediatrics
7 ICU/CCU
23 Day Beds
16 Five Day Ward

339 Total

Activity for 2001 and 2002

The following table shows activity in the Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital for 2001 and 2002:

Inpatients	Admissions 2001	Admissions 2002
Surgery	3146	2580
Medicine	4659	4640
Orthopaedics	1471	1553
Paediatrics	3136	2656
Obstetrics	6210	6015
Gynaecology	1801	2154
ENT	267	153
Other	16	-
Total	20706	19751

Day Patients	2001	2002
General Surgery	2528	3058
General Medical	1230	1164
Orthopaedics	359	306
Paediatrics	412	698
Urology	479	439
Oncology	863	995
Obstetrics	1014	1389
Gynaecology	676	1020
Elderly	327	310
ENT	108	140
Dermatology	-	272
Other	3	64
Total	7999	9855

Casualty	2001	2002
New	30234	32107
Reviews	2499	2700
Total	32733	34807

2001	2002
2968	3298

Change in Delivery of Orthopaedic Services

Orthopaedic Services in the North Eastern Health Board area were re-organised with effect from February 2003 on a phased basis. Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, Drogheda treat all Orthopaedic Trauma cases in the region while Our Lady’s Hospital, Navan is the site for Elective Orthopaedic work.

The re-organisation of Orthopaedic Services in the North-East means an enhanced Orthopaedic service for patients across the region with a significant increase in the number of patients undergoing elective orthopaedic surgery at Our Lady’s Hospital, Navan. Elective Orthopaedic clinics will also be held in Dundalk, Cavan and Monaghan.

This re-organisation of services means an immediate increase in the number of elective operating sessions in Our Lady’s Hospital, Navan with an initial increase from nine to fifteen sessions. In due course there will be twenty elective operating sessions per week, which will have dramatic impact on reducing waiting lists in the NEHB region.

The re-organisation provides the capacity to increase the number of primary joint replacements (e.g. Hip Replacements) from 350 to 500 per annum.

The change means greater specialisation (e.g. Knees and Hands) in Our Lady’s Hospital, Navan in the field of Orthopaedic surgery.

There is now increased Orthopaedic Consultant Sessions at the Navan site thus enabling the further expansion of NCHD orthopaedic training in the North Eastern Health Board region.

The change in service delivery will result in a higher quality of patient care and will enable a greater utilisation of existing resources. This will create a more cost effective service. The streamlining of services will lead to more patients being seen and a significant increase in the number of operations being carried out.

To provide a quality service and ideal training arrangements best practice recommends that all orthopaedic trauma should be on one site. This approach to the delivery of Orthopaedic Services is supported by the Irish Institute of Orthopaedic Surgeons, the Special Advisory Committee of the Combined Surgical Colleges in the UK and Ireland and the Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeons in the Louth/Meath Hospital Group.