by HRHQ Editorial Team
Sláintecare 2025+ aims to forge the way towards accessible, affordable, high-quality, healthcare for the people of Ireland when they need it, where they need it.
Significant investment in healthcare infrastructure and workforce is being made to ensure the long-term demographic challenges and deficit in health and social care infrastructure Ireland faces are addressed.
Improving Service Quality is a critical Sláintecare priority across a number of service areas. Public Health, Prevention and Promotion will play a significant role in improving the overall health of the population, including through measures designed to promote healthy lifestyles, address mental health difficulties and reduce inequalities.
The new plan will focus on enabling reform measures critical to the successful delivery of Sláintecare. The digital health strategy will empower both workforce and patients to use new technologies such as the HSE’s new Health App. Realising the ambition set out in this strategy will not be possible without the ongoing and greatly valued expertise and dedication of the entire health and social care workforce.
SC2025+ will bring a new patient focus to services that are both affordable and of the highest quality and where the patient is at the centre of all our collective efforts.
Minister Carroll MacNeill also published the Sláintecare Implementation Progress Report 2024, noting the ongoing progress made in transforming our health and social care services to provide the Right Care, in the Right Place, at the Right Time.
There has been a significant reduction in the cumulative daily 8.00am trolley count over 2024, with numbers down 11% compared to 2023, despite an 8% increase in the number of patients presenting to Emergency Departments. The volume of weekend discharges (Friday – Sunday) from acute hospital beds increased by 15%* in 2024 compared to 2023, while total discharges increased by approximately 12%.
The six new HSE Health Regions commenced in March 2024 and the six Regional Executive Officers (REOs) are now fully accountable and responsible for the planning and delivery of integrated care for their respective populations.
2024 saw the publication of ‘Digital for Care 2030: A Digital Health Framework for Ireland 2024-2030’ setting out a vision that aims for better health outcomes enabled by seamless, safe, secure, and connected digital health services, which supports health and wellbeing for both our patients and providers.
*St Vincent’s and Wexford excluded from calculations
