THE FATHER OF a baby with congenital heart disease has thanked members of the public for their support after speaking about travelling to Northern Ireland on Christmas Day to get medical supplies.
In an open letter last week to Minister for Health Leo Varadkar, Adam Doyle explained that the family had run out of special tubes and syringes needed to feed 11-month-old Noah Doyle, and that hospital staff were unable to provide emergency equipment because of the delay to his son’s medical card application.
Noah has a number of other health problems besides his heart condition, including severe scoliosis, an underdeveloped skull, a kidney defect and narrow food and air ways.
“When we phoned your department to explain this, an urgent request was raised to the medical officer with a response promised in 24-48 hours,” Doyle wrote.
To date, five working days later, we have had no reply.
On Christmas day I had to travel to a hospital in Northern Ireland and appeal to them directly to get some additional supplies so as to keep him from being admitted to hospital over his first Christmas.
Fortunately they were more compassionate than you and your department.
Encouragement
Doyle confirmed on Saturday that his son is now scheduled for surgery this week to “help ease some of his problems”.
He thanked ”all of the people who were very kind to us in the last few days, offering support, encouragement and of course helping to spread our story”.
“He has a tough road ahead but we will work every second of our lives to help him through it,” Doyle said in a Facebook post.
Caring for him is the greatest honour I could ever have.
His son, he said last week, had been given “a really sh*tty deal in life, but quite possibly his worst piece of luck was being born here, where meeting unrealistic budgets are more important than caring for babies and where paperwork and bureaucracy are more important than getting food into a sick baby’s belly”.
The HSE has since apologised for the delay in issuing a medical card.
“There was an administrative delay in the processing of a medical card for baby Noah,” it said in a statement.
A medical card was issued to him [on Wednesday]. The HSE has contacted baby Noah’s father to apologise for the delay and for any distress the delay may have caused.
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